Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

AUSTRALIAN ESTATES COMPANIES BILL

Read a Second time and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

BRITISH RAILWAYS BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS (FELIXSTOWE) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

GREATER LONDON COUNCIL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

LONDON TRANSPORT BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

NOTTINGHAM CITY COUNCIL BILL

Read a Second time and committed.

Ordered,
That it be an Instruction to the Committee on the Bill to amend Part II of that Bill in order to provide that no application for a licence under that Part shall be unreasonably refused and in particular that no licence shall be refused merely in order to restrict the total number of such licences or because the applicant has not previously held a licence under Part II of that Bill or a hackney carriage licence.—[Mr. English.]

RIVER MEDWAY (FLOOD RELIEF) BILL

Read a Second time and committed.

SCOTTISH AMICABLE LIFE ASSURANCE SOCIETY BILL

Read a Second time and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

STANDARD LIFE ASSURANCE COMPANY BILL

Read a Second time and referred to the Examiners of Petitions for Private Bills.

SUFFOLK COASTAL DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

TEES TUNNEL BILL

Read a Second time and committed.

WEST MIDLANDS COUNTY COUNCIL BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

Oral Answers to Questions — SOCIAL. SERVICES

Households in Need (Survey)

Mr. Michael Marshall: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is the cost to public funds of the survey carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys into which types of households are in the greatest need of help from her department.

The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Dr. David Owen): £60,000.

Mr. Marshall: Is the Minister aware of the widespread feeling that this type of information ought to be readily available from the 1971 census and other sources and that if this information is not already available, there is something wrong with our system? Is he not further aware of particular cases, such as that concerning one of my constituents, a former civil servant, who has already made submissions to the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys pointing out that this is merely management by excuse and that the whole exercise involving a questionnaire and a follow-up letter is a waste of public money? How does he propose to check this kind of expenditure in future?

Dr. Owen: I disagree with the hon. Gentleman. The problem of the elderly is the biggest social problem that this country faces. There is not enough information about those most in need and those to whom we should be applying public money. The course that the hon. Gentleman is advocating will be best served by having a greater and more effective information base.

Mr. Marten: Will the survey identify families with disabled people?

Dr. Owen: Its main aim is to try to identify the type of help needed. Therefore, it will take account of some elements of disability. However, I shall send the hon. Gentleman some of the more detailed information.

Heating Allowance

Mr. Hooley: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many persons drawing supplementary benefit are currently also drawing the extra heating addition (at any of the three rates).

The Under-Secretary of State for Social Services (Mr. Michael Meacher): As at May 1975—the latest date for which information is available—792,000.

Mr. Hooley: I am obliged to my hon. Friend for that information. Does he agree that it is time that we got rid of this nonsense of three distinct rates separated by a few pence for this particular form of benefit? Does he also agree that, in view of the immense increases in the prices of gas and electricity, elderly people of retirement age should automatically draw this heating allowance if they are in receipt of supplementary benefit?

Mr. Meacher: The purpose of having three different levels is to take account of differences in health, the type of accommodation and the ease with which that accommodation can be heated. My hon. Friend can be assured that no fewer than 41 per cent. of all supplementary pensioners are in receipt of extra heating additions. Also, to take account of the increase in fuel prices, since the last Conservative increase in Octobr 1973 the pensioner index has risen 50 per cent., the fuel component 65 per cent., and the pension 70 per cent.

Mrs. Bain: Has the Minister given any consideration to the system operating in other countries, such as the Scandinavian countries and Canada, whereby heating costs are included in the rent of a property? Does he not agree that, as more people seem to be aware of rent and rate rebates, this might be a way of catching those who are unaware of the heating allowance? I find that many pensioners in my constituency are unaware of the heating allowances available to them,

Mr. Meacher: The Supplementary Benefits Commission makes every attempt to increase the number of claims from pensioners who might be entitled to extra heating additions and to ensure that those


entitled receive them. During the past two or three years the number entitled to extra heating additions has substantially increased. Of the 792,000 who receive such help no fewer than 701,000 are pensioners.

Mr. Bowden: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that many branches of Age Concern—the chairman of the Brighton branch has written to the Secretary of State—are anxious about the levels of heating allowances? Does he accept that in Brighton and many other parts of the country some pensioners have to choose between having adequate temperatures in their homes and having sufficient food? Will he please do his utmost to raise these levels as quickly as possible?

Mr. Meacher: In November last year the Government raised extra heating additions by three-eighths. Since we have been in office these additions have been increased by 83 per cent.—more than the pension increase of 70 per cent. which was itself substantially above the rise in prices.

Mr. Mike Thomas: Does not my hon. Friend feel any sense of injustice that his Department is expected to bear the brunt, on the one hand, of unfair tariff structures in the electricity and gas industries and, on the other, of the dubious behaviour of the electricity boards in the late 1960s in persuading local councils not to fit all-electric flats with a gas supply?

Mr. Meacher: This matter, to which my hon. Friend is right to refer, has caused considerable concern. On behalf of the electricity and gas supply industries, which are the responsibility of another Department, I would say that there are statutes that prevent their giving preferential tariffs to particular groups of clients. Nevertheless, this remains an important problem, particularly as it affects disconnections. I assure my hon. Friend that we are very much aware of it.

Mrs. Chalker: Will the hon. Gentleman do something about the lack of take-up among many pensioners? We were due to have a new leaflet in November. Many local offices still do not have it and many pensioners do not know what they may have. Will he also expand the

leaflet to explain that they may have prepayment meters if they apply, for many pensioners still do not understand this matter?

Mr. Meacher: A copy of the leaflet to which the hon. Lady has referred—OC2, "Help with Heating Costs"—is available in the Library. It sets out the criteria for awarding extra heating additions. The revised print, which is already available, will be circulated within the next few days.

Poverty Trap

Mr. Peter Bottomley: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is the number of families with children who are theoretically subject to a marginal tax rate of 75 per cent. and over, bearing in mind loss of entitlement to FIS, rent allowances, rate rebates and other means tested benefits upon any increase in income.

Mr. Meacher: In August 1974, the latest date for which figures are available, the number of families with children which were theoretically subject to a marginal tax rate of 75 per cent. or over on a pay rise of £1 was about 200,000. This is about 3 per cent. of such families.

Mr. Bottomley: Are the Government aware that this is purely the result of their inability to take on board the importance of the tax credit scheme and of putting off the child benefit action for two years and probably for another four years? Are they further aware that we shall not get out of this appalling situation, which gives no incentives to many families—1 million people are involved in the 200,000 families to whom the Minister referred—until we have a new Beveridge Report and take firm action?
Lastly, will the Minister comment on how long we shall go on having incomes policies totally unrelated to people's family responsibilities? The sort of incomes policy that we now have—

Mr. Speaker: Order. This is becoming argument.

Mr. Meacher: If the hon. Gentleman is seeking tax credits as a way out of this admitted dilemma, he should be


aware that the cost in current price terms is about £3 billion. The Tory Government's scheme of a few years ago had a cost tag on it of £1·3 billion. They did not tell us then how they proposed to pay for it and they have not yet told us how they would pay for the present cost of £3 billion. I do not see how they would pay for it when the Leader of the Opposition seems hell bent on increasing defence expenditure on tanks and rockets.
The root cause of this problem lies in the interaction between means tests and the low tax threshold. As to means tests, the hon. Gentleman should bear in mind that the Conservative Government introduced the two main causes of the poverty trap—the family income supplement and the big increase in means-tested rents under the Housing Finance Act 1972.

Mr. Ralph Howell: What action do the Government intend to take to remedy the poverty trap? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that families are being taxed at levels below the social security benefit level and that in some instances the same amount is being taken in tax as is being paid in FIS? That is a totally absurd situation. May I remind the hon. Gentleman how vocal he was on the subject when in opposition and how quiet he is at the moment?

Mr. Meacher: The tax threshold is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. We have not introduced any new means tests since we have been in office compared with the two significant means tests introduced by the Conservative Government. We have relied on the new non-means tested benefits that we have introduced—the non-contributory invalidity benefit, the mobility allowance, the child benefit and the child interim benefit. Far from being silent, that is a very vocal testimony to our belief that the way out of the poverty trap is to avoid means testing.

Doctors (Emigration)

Mr. Hurd: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if she will make a statement on the number of doctors emigrating from the United Kingdom to other EEC countries.

The Secretary of State for Social Services (Mrs. Barbara Castle): The latest information available relates to 1971–72 when 40 British doctors left for other member States of the EEC. I am, however, arranging for special monitoring of movement to and from the EEC so as to provide more up-to-date information on a regular basis and to assess the effect of the directives on free movement which come into effect on 1st January 1977.

Mr. Hurd: I am grateful to the Secretary of State for that reply. Are not these figures likely to increase as qualifications inside the Community are harmonised and as uncertainty about our National Health Service increases? Will the right hon. Lady do something about that uncertainty by getting on with setting up the Royal Commission? Why is it that, three months after the original announcement, we still have no chairman, no members, no board, nothing?

Mrs. Castle: It is impossible for any of us to predict the effect of the directives. All kinds of factors are at work here. For instance, there is the language barrier. I should not like to try to prophesy what the effect of the directives will be.
I assure the hon. Gentleman that satisfactory progress is being made with the Royal Commission.

Mr. Dalyell: On the subject of the emigration of doctors, has the Secretary of State noticed the extreme concern and caution about the Government's devolution and Assembly plans shown by the Scottish BMA and other doctors' organisations in Scotland?

Mrs. Castle: I must be honest and tell my hon. Friend that I have not yet had the opportunity of studying that problem.

Dr. Vaughan: Does the Secretary of State agree that fewer doctors would be emigrating and medical morale would be higher if, for example, she could explain how she justifies bringing patients from overseas direct into NHS beds, thereby jumping queues, and supplying a different standard of service for people in this country?

Mrs. Castle: As usual, the hon. and medical Gentleman is inaccurate. I should love to be able to answer that question


in detail. Unfortunately, there is a later Question on that subject and I must restrain myself.

Dr. M. S. Miller: Will my right hon. Friend not worry too much about British doctors emigrating to other parts of the EEC? Is she aware that some British doctors who emigrated to that other Shangri-La of medicine—the United States—are finding conditions very much less attractive there than here, that to insure themselves against possible litigation by patients is costing them almost as much as they are earning in fees, and that many of them would be happy to return to the relative security of the National Health Service?

Mrs. Castle: I think my hon. Friend is right. During all this discussion on emigration and intentions to emigrate—there has been a rising trend, I agree—it has been significant that our preliminary surveys have shown that in September 1975 there were more hospital doctors in post in this country than in September 1974.

Mr. Stonehouse: On a point of order. As progress is so slow that my Question No. 38 on pay beds will not be reached, may I forgo my Question so that the Secretary of State may reply to it now?

Mr. Speaker: I would much rather have points of order at the end of Question Time.

Regulations

Mr. Gow: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what proposals she has for simplifying the current regulations governing the payment of social security benefits.

The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Mr. Brian O'Malley): Statutory regulations are expressed as simply as is consistent with the need for legal provisions. The substance of them is set out in everyday English in free information leaflets which are readily available to the public.

Mr. Gow: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that at present more than 120 separate leaflets are in force giving details of entitlement to supplementary benefit and war pensions? Has the Minister read any of those 120 documents issued

by his Department? Does he not think that the level of take-up of supplementary benefits might be increased significantly if those leaflets were simplified and streamlined?

Mr. O'Malley: I have read them. Recent editions of leaflets that have come out of my Department are far simpler and better presented than anything published in earlier years. The hon. Gentleman is right when he says that with means-tested benefits there is inevitably a major question of take-up. This Government have done everything possible to encourage the maximum possible take-up of means-tested benefits, but of course the solution, as my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary explained earlier, is flatly in contradiction to the policies of the previous Government, who sought to extend means-testing rather than reduce it, as we are doing, for example, under the Social Security Pensions Act 1975.

Mr. Ogden: Will my right hon. Friend give his attention to the difficulties that can be caused to those receiving supplementary benefits when the Giro draft is either lost in the post or stolen? The recipient then has to wait seven or more weeks before he can claim the benefit. Is there not a way in which that amount could be credited and, if the form later shows up, any benefits received repaid?

Mr. O'Malley: Although only a tiny proportion of benefits paid by Giro is lost in the post, or lost for any other reason, such a loss presents a problem for individuals. I am prepared to consider any suggestions that my hon. Friend has on the matter.

Supplementary Benefits

Mr. MacGregor: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what has been the increase in annual expenditure on supplementary benefits from 1961–62 to the latest available date.

Mr. O'Malley: Expenditure increased from £168 million in 1961–62 to an estimated £1,125 million in the calendar year 1975.

Mr. MacGregor: Is the right hon. hon. Gentleman aware that in a recent article quoting similar figures the Chairman of the Supplementary Benefits Commission has referred to the fact that the climate in which social security benefits are being


considered in the country at large is changing and that often poor hardworking people are making the most complaints about it? It is causing great resentment among them that, because benefits are overtaking our very low tax thresholds, there is often little incentive to be in work and that frequently it is better to be out of work. In view of the remarks made earlier today about tax thresholds, will he ask the Secretary of State to consider setting up a working party with the Chancellor of the Exchequer urgently to sort out this whole confusing, often nonsensical and potentially damaging interaction between the tax systems and benefits?

Mr. O'Malley: I have read the article by Professor Donnison to which the hon. Gentleman refers and I agree with its contents. I will bring the hon. Gentleman's second observation to the attention of the Chancellor.

Mrs. Hayman: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is an area of great need for further expenditure on supplementary benefits, that of one-parent families? Does he agree that many such families dependent on supplementary benefit have been disappointed about the child interim benefit? Having done something for those families not dependent on supplementary benefit, will he now look as a matter of urgency at the two main recommendations that the Finer Committee made for lone parents on supplementary benefit—a shorter qualifying time for the long-term addition and a special cash addition for lone parents and their children?

Mr. O'Malley: The Secretary of State has made clear the Government's position on what my hon. Friend described as the principal recommendation of the Finer Committee which was, of course, for a means-tested benefit. We have made clear our objections to any extension of the principle of means testing. My hon. Friend may be aware that between 1961 and 1975 the number of one-parent families helped through the supplementary benefit system increased from 76,000 to 245,000. However, I will certainly consider any other outstanding matters that my hon. Friend has raised.

Mr. Alan Clark: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if she is satisfied

with the criteria applied to the distribution of supplementary benefit.

Mr. O'Malley: The present criteria for entitlement to supplementary benefit have been operated under successive Governments. I am always willing to consider constructive suggestions for improvements to the system.

Mr. Clark: Does the Minister realise that there is a practice among certain types of claimant of drawing supplementary benefit to meet some or all of the costs of their rent and then either keeping the money or spending it on themselves? Does he not agree that this is a fraud on the Exchequer, a fraud on all those who work and pay rent out of their own resources, and a fraud on the landlord, and yet it is not legally culpable? What steps is the Minister taking to remedy this situation?

Mr. O'Malley: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me prior notice of his supplementary question with the sting in the tail—as it was called in the Sunday Independent of 18th January. It was very useful to me. Seriously, however, I think that the most sensible way to deal with this problem is through the powers, which the Supplementary Benefit Commission already has, whereby in cases of persistent default in rent payment arrangements can be made for the rent to be paid directly by the Commission's officers either to the local authority or to the landlord. That is the most sensible way of dealing with the problem.

Hospital Service

Mr. Michael Latham: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services whether she will make a statement on the level of morale and job-satisfaction within the medical side of the hospital service; and what steps she is taking to improve the present position.

Dr. Owen: I would refer the hon. Member to the statements made in the House by my right hon. Friend on 12th and 15th December.—{Vol. 902, c. 828–39; Vol. 902, c. 971–79.]

Mr. Latham: Is not the simple truth that morale is appalling and that it is not being made any better by the depressing sight of the right hon. Lady hawking our pay beds around the courts of Persia and Arabia?

Dr. Owen: That is not what my right hon. Friend did. On the general question of morale, I do not believe that it is anywhere near as bad as Conservative Members seem to think. They would do the National Health Service a great deal of good if they occasionally spoke up for the remarkable amount of activity which goes on in the NHS in helping patients in many areas and spent a little less time sniping at the Service.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: But does not the right hon. Gentleman recognise the dismay and anger that his right hon. Friend has caused by refusing to refer the pay beds issue to the Royal Commission and now being forced to admit to a consultant practising in the St. Mary's group of hospitals that it is impossible to say whether there will be any speeding up of the making of appointments or hospital admissions for National Health Service patients following the abolition of pay beds?

Dr. Owen: I do not think that many people would deny that the freeing of some pay beds in some hospitals for the National Health Service will help to reduce waiting lists, particularly when they are associated with new, modern hospitals. As for the hon. Gentleman's other remark, I gather that we cannot find any evidence of this, but if he has a copy of the letter, I shall be interested to look at it.

National Health Service (Reorganisation)

Mr. Beith: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services whether she plans to introduce proposals to change the administrative structure of the reorganised National Health Service so as to make it more accountable to the community and to reduce its administrative costs.

Mrs. Castle: I do not intend to make any sudden drastic change in the structure of the reorganised NHS in England so soon after the major changes in 1974 but we will continue to consider and introduce where appropriate evolutionary changes so as to minimise some of the disadvantages of the 1974 reorganisation. I believe our decisions to increase the proportion of local authority members on health authorities and to strengthen the

role of community health councils, which are being implemented within the structure we inherited from our predecessors, will make the service more responsive to the views of the community. I have already asked health authorities in England to review their administrative costs in all disciplines.

Mr. Beith: I thank the right hon. Lady for that reply and recognise that this costly, over-administered and undemocratic structure was bequeathed to her by the previous Government. However, does she not agree that when we are talking of devolution, the redemocratisation of the National Health Service should be a priority and that even more of a priority is to deal with the number of administrative and supervisory posts which were created, many of them taken up by people whose professional skills would be better used at the bedside and in medical facilities? Does she not agree that the Health Service is one of the main areas which has more Chiefs than Indians?

Mrs. Castle: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for recognising that I have been bound by the administrative structure that I inherited from my predecessors. It was impossible for me to reverse all their work within a matter of weeks of taking over my new responsibilities. All that we could do, as I have explained, was to take democratisation as far as we could within the legislative and administrative structure that we inherited. As for the administrative top-heaviness of our predecessors' structure, I have been in touch with the health authorities to do what we can to streamline without turning the whole new system upside down. I therefore told the health authorities that the filling of vacancies or additional posts should take place only after full consideration of both the need for the post relative to a specific job of work and the real priority of that job of work. We have also been trying to cut out unnecessary duplication through tiers and to secure the maximum devolution, thereby streamlining within the existing structure.

Mrs. Renée Short: Will my right hon. Friend give an undertaking to the House that she will respond favourably to the growing number of community health


councils, including every one in Birmingham, which are demanding greater facilities for the termination of pregnancy in NHS hospitals now that they have reviewed the inadequacies in different parts of the country?

Mrs. Castle: The community health councils bring pressure to bear upon their appropriate health authorities. This is going on all the time. I am glad that many health authorities are increasingly paying attention to and co-operating with the community health councils over a large number of issues.

Hospital Staffs

Mr. Atkinson: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if she will investigate the reasons why hospitals are understaffed during periods of widespread unemployment.

Dr. Owen: Hospital staffing levels are determined primarily by the financial resources approved by Parliament and the availability of professionally qualified staff.

Mr. Atkinson: Is my hon. Friend aware, however, that the National Health Service is certainly still the Cinderella service of all the public services in the sense that over the last 20 years—at any rate, until the end of 1974—the percentage of gross domestic product donated to the Health Service was estimated at about 3·6 per cent? As a result, the situation is now somewhat ludicrous, because hospital boards cannot encourage people to take jobs in hospitals when their take-home pay, in the absence of excessive overtime, is less than they could receive if they were drawing supplementary benefit. When the take-home pay of portering and catering staffs in hospitals is compared with benefits of the kind I have mentioned, it will be appreciated that that is a deterrent to working in the Service. Does this not illustrate not that social benefits are too high but that the blessed wages paid in the Service are too low?

Dr. Owen: No one would say that the wage structure in the Health Service was perfect by any means. However, in the last two wage settlements my right hon. Friend has been able to achieve a very considerable improvement in the

very low wages among some of the ancillary workers. The £6 settlement has helped them relative to other sections of the community. However, as my hon. Friend pointed out, this has been achieved only by a conscious decision to increase the percentage of the gross national product devoted to the Service—for example by 0·5 per cent. last year.

Dr. Vaughan: Does the Minister agree that the policy of closing down small local hospitals that are both economic and fairly easy to staff will increase staffing problems for nurses considerably?

Dr. Owen: It depends on which hospitals are involved. Some small hospitals are economic and easy to staff and they should be retained. Some small hospitals are uneconomic, expensive and often situated in areas where there are already many more beds per head of population than in other areas. Some of these hospitals ought to be closed. That is particularly true of some of the bigger centres and the cities.

Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970

Mr. Carter-Jones: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if she will publish the statistics relating to services provided under Section 2 of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 by local authorities in the last financial year; and if she will make a statement.

The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security (Mr. Alfred Morris): As the Answer is in the form of a table of figures, I will circulate the information in the Official Report. The tables showing provision by individual local authorities are being printed and copies will be placed in the Library of the House shortly. My hon. Friend will be pleased to learn that in 1974–75 there was an increase of nearly 18 per cent. in the number of households helped under Section 2 of the Act compared with the previous year.

Mr. Carter-Jones: Will my hon. Friend take it from me that we are delighted that there has been an increase in average spending, but that this is an average figure and means that some local authorities have done extremely well and that others have done very badly? Will he congratulate


those local authorities which have done well under Section 2. Will he please remind the laggards that this section went through without a vote in the House and with the full approval of Parliament? Will he bring that home to the laggard authorities?

Mr. Morris: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The whole House appreciates my hon. Friend's active, sustained and wholly genuine concern to ensure full and humane implementation of the Act. He will appreciate that I am deeply concerned also to see that the Act is applied in the interests of all disabled people. The figures reveal differences in provision. The increase of 18 per cent., however, is notable. We must also bear in mind that 136,000 names of severely disabled people were added to the registers of local authorities in 1974–75. This was a notable achievement by many local authorities in widely different parts of Britain.

Mr. Boscawen: Do not the present financial restrictions render much of the very desirable practical help which the Act obliges local authorities to undertake ineffective and impossible for many local authorities? Would it not be better if the Secretary of State considered an amendment to the Act so as to narrow the field in which local authorities are obliged to undertake these desirable measures so that the authorities can attend to the most vital areas of need, such as help in education for austistic children, much more thoroughly than now?

Mr. Morris: We have no plans whatever to amend the Act. We have made the mandatory nature of Section 2 clear to local authorities. Our legal advice is that once a local authority accepts that need exists in respect of one of the services listed in the section, it is incumbent upon it to make arrangements to meet that need. In the present economic situation there are, of course, difficulties about balancing the discharge of the duty with due exercise of financial restraint. There has, however, been a remarkable amount of progress in the past year. There was an article in The Times yesterday showing what superb results can be achieved by local authorities. I hope that all right hon. and hon. Members will read that article.

Following is the information:


Form of Assistance
Number of households helped in 1974–75
Comparable figures for 1973–74


Telephones
22,000
21,800


Attachments
1,600
1,100


Rentals
47,100
28,800


Other communication equipment
2,000
1,600


Television installed
2,200
2,500


Licences
16,000
6,500


Radio
500
900


Other personal aids
159,400
142,500


Adaptations—




Private, Minor
16,900
17,500


Private, Major
1,900
1,600


Local Authority
22,500
20,000


Net total*
233,600†
198,500


* Some households received more than one form of help.


† Including estimates made for local authorities unable to supply information.

Retirement Pension

Mr. Canavan: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what is the current purchasing power of the retirement pension, compared with March 1974.

Mr. O'Malley: On the basis of the movement in the General Index of Retail Prices between March 1974 and December 1975 the purchasing power of the retirement pension is currently about 20 per cent. higher than in March 1974.

Mr. Canavan: I recognise the very laudable achievements of the Government in raising the retirement pension by some 70 per cent. since Labour took office. However, is it not a fact, bearing in mind what the Minister has just said, that much of that increase has been eroded by increased prices for essentials such as food and fuel? Does my right hon. Friend accept that we have still a long way to go to achieve adequate standards of social justice for our senior citizens? Will he begin by giving serious consideration to the efforts of Jack Jones and others in the Labour movement and the trade union movement to get pensions increased by this spring to a level of £18·50 for a single person and £28 for a married couple?

Mr. O'Malley: My hon. Friend is wrong to assume that the value of the pension has been significantly eroded. As a result of the November uprating, the real value of the pension was higher


than its value when we increased it significantly to £10 in July 1974. That was a far greater increase than anything which had been achieved by the previous Conservative Administration.
My hon. Friend is right and the whole of the Labour movement is right in believing in and implementing better pensions. That is precisely what our new long-term pension scheme will achieve. It will mean an end to the massive dependence on means testing in old age, which is a characteristic of the present system.
As regards future upratings, my hon. Friend will recognise that the last uprating took place in November. The record of this Administration demonstrates that we have introduced upratings within as brief a period as has been necessary. We shall do everything in future to protect the pensioner against the erosion of the pension by inflation.

Mr. Kenneth Clarke: Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that we have waited a long time for the announcement of the operative date of uprating? Will the right hon. Gentleman concede that while we have been waiting for the announcement of the uprating to protect pensions against the effects of inflation—namely, since March 1975—we have seen the highest rate of inflation that has taken place even under this Government? Is the delay due to the fact that the buoyant revenues from earnings-related national insurance contributions are being entirely consumed by the present disgraceful level of unemployment?

Mr. O'Malley: I shall take representations for better pensions from my hon. Friends, but not from Opposition Front Bench spokesmen. The record of the Opposition on the subject of pensions is absolutely appalling. The figures demonstrate that. For example, when their upratings occurred in October 1972 and 1973, their real value was respectively £8·42 and £8·80. The present Administration, in the face of considerable economic and financial difficulties, has raised the real value to £10. We have increased and improved pensions since coming into office.

Fluoridation

Mrs. Renée Short: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what

action she intends to take in connection with the report on fluoridation.

Dr. Owen: I welcome the recent report of the Royal College of Physicians as further authoritative independent medical endorsement of the safety and efficacy of fluoridation as a community health measure for protection against dental decay.
I am writing to all area health authorities, in the light of this report, asking them to give very urgent consideration to the issue as part of their preventive health responsibilities.

Mrs. Short: I am obliged to my hon. Friend for that reply. In view of the cost to the nation's health of dental caries, will my hon. Friend also undertake to consult his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science to ascertain what urgent action can be taken to help both parents and their children to look after their teeth by taking fluoride voluntarily until such time as the water authorities are able to act?

Dr. Owen: I gladly undertake to enter into those discussions, but I must reiterate that the tablets taken to help with the fluoride problem are only one measure. A more satisfactory measure would be general fluoridation. However, my hon. Friend is right to express her concern. The general dental practitioners' service costs some £140 million a year.

Sir B. Rhys Williams: Instead of encouraging compulsory mass medication through the water supply, would not the Department do better to encourage the sale of suitably medicated sweets and toothpastes as a way of introducing fluoride?

Dr. Owen: All the evidence shows that that is nowhere near as effective as fluoridation. We are not encouraging compulsory mass fluoridation. This is a decision to be taken by area health authorities in the light of their preventive health responsibilities. I hope that they will consider the evidence. The report from the Royal College of Physicians is authoritative.

Immigrant Doctors

Mr. Grylls: asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what percentage of immigrant doctors sitting examinations


for eligibility to practise in the United Kingdom have passed on the last three occasions when the examinations have been taken.

Mrs. Castle: The test arranged by the General Medical Council applies only to overseas doctors who are seeking temporary registration in this country for the first time. In the last three tests the percentage pass rate was 29 per cent., 31 per cent. and 38 per cent.

Mr. Grylls: Does the Secretary of State agree that the figures show that the number of doctors coming into the country will drop quite drastically? If that happens, how will she honour her promise to the junior doctors to reduce their hours of work, bearing in mind what she told the House in December? Is it not true that to honour that promise she will have to rely on British doctors and that we shall have to pay them proper rates of overtime?

Mrs. Castle: I think that it is too early to assess the effects of these examinations and tests on future manpower in the National Health Service. We are monitoring the situation very closely. We recognise the valuable contribution that overseas doctors have made to the Service, but we are determined to expand the intakes of our own medical schools. That expansion programme is going ahead and it will go ahead whatever economic stringencies may prevail.

CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (INTERVIEW)

Mr. George Gardiner: asked the Prime Minister whether the statements by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on economic policy in his London Weekend Television interview on 4th January represent Government policy.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Wilson): Yes, Sir.

Mr. Gardiner: I ask the Prime Minister specifically whether he agrees with two statements made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the course of that interview. First, his right hon. Friend said that there could be no question of replacing the present £6 pay limit with another

flat rate and that there must be more flexibility so as to allow for differentials. Secondly, he said that there was a special case for giving some tax relief to middle income earners. The right hon. Gentleman confessed that he had given them quite a caning. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree with those two statements?

The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend did not use quite the expression the hon. Gentleman has mentioned. He indicated the case for more flexibility, but this issue has not yet been decided, as my right hon. Friend made clear at the time. My right hon. Friend was speaking on behalf of Her Majesty's Government in that second statement.

Mr. Skinner: Is my right hon. Friend aware that since the Chancellor's broadcast, when he talked about giving some element of tax relief to the middle class—namely, those earning between £4,000 and £8,000 per annum—the Secretary of State for the Home Department has said—quite alarmingly, most people in the PLP would think—that when public expenditure as a proportion of national income reaches 60 per cent. and beyond, the result is that a pluralist democracy is in danger?
Taking into account the two restrictions mentioned by the Chancellor and the Home Secretary and today's ministerial replies about pensions, how are we to observe what my right hon. Friends have said and at the same time get better pensions, more hospitals and more housing? Does my right hon. Friend agree that he should get these people together?

The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friends are together. The Question on the Order Paper relates to a broadcast by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. If my hon. Friend wishes to table a Question about the speech of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department, I shall be delighted to answer it.

Mr. Duffy: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the conclusion drawn in the latest report of the Price Commission—that inflation is now slowing down, but that it is still relatively too high for pressure to be significantly eased on the exchange rate and, therefore, on import costs, and that much the greater part of


the improvement is attributed to the almost universal observance of the £6 voluntary limit on pay increases?

The Prime Minister: Yes, the current report of the Price Commission is an extremely important document and marks a very important stage in the fight against inflation. I am sure that its conclusions will be as welcome to Opposition Members as it is clearly welcome to my hon. Friend and myself. He will be aware of course, that the Commission's own index and other published indices show a very significant fall in the rate of inflation.

Mr. Peter Morrison: asked the Prime Minister whether the television interview given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 4th January on the economy represents Government policy.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave earlier today to the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Gardiner).

Mr. Morrison: Will the Prime Minister give his own views about the restoration of differentials? Will he support the attempts of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to resist the pressure from his left wing to reflate the economy?

The Prime Minister: The subject of differentials and the next stage of the anti-inflation policy will have to be discussed with all concerned. At this stage it is impossible to forecast the right answer. There must be discussions. During the greater part of last summer I was badgered by the Opposition to do something, presumably statutory. We have achieved the right answer, it is working, and the hon. Gentleman should wait for the progress of further consultations.

Mr. Newens: Is it not hypocritical for Opposition Members to press for cuts in public expenditure and at the same time to press for increased expenditure on armaments in the spirit of the cold war?

The Prime Minister: The speech made last week, which has been the subject of some comment this afternoon, contained a complaint about a cut of £4·8 billion in the defence review last year. Any party that claims to want to cut Government expenditure overall must start by replacing that £4·8 billion as well as dealing

with Maplin, the Channel Tunnel and all its other commitments.
On the subject of public expenditure, I was interested to note the forthcoming and frank statement by the right hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe), who advocated cuts in expenditure this year rather than three years ahead. He admitted that this would cause additional unemployment this year. The House should know whether the Leader of the Opposition supports that view.

PRIME MINISTER (VISITS)

Mr. Trotter: asked the Prime Minister when he next intends to visit Portsmouth.

The Prime Minister: I have at present no plans to do so, Sir.

Mr. Trotter: Is the Prime Minister aware from his visits to naval and other military bases of the ever-increasing Russian military strength? Does he realise that the Russian Socialists are realistic and appreciate not only military strength but willpower? Although they undoubtedly wish to see a Socialist Government here, they will respect Britain more if we are led by an iron lady rather than by a plasticine man.

The Prime Minister: The Soviet Union, which is composed of realists, pays less attention to the odd speech here or there than it pays to the record of Her Majestys' Government's support of NATO and our determination to maintain its strength.

Mr. Frank Allaun: Is the Prime Minister aware of the even greater military strength of the United States? Do not both great Powers possess the ability to overkill? Is there any sense in the United Kingdom's indulging further in this nonsense, because there is no defence against nuclear weapons?

The Prime Minister: Anybody in my position must be fully aware of the great contribution made by the United States, together with other European countries, to NATO. The balance of military power and of ability in nuclear matters—the balance of terror, as my hon. Friend might prefer to put it—has been significant in achieving detente between the two super blocs, and therefore between NATO and


the Warsaw Pact countries. Because of this situation, the achievements of Helsinki, which I believe to have been real, were possible, although not every Conservative Member welcomes that.

Mrs. Thatcher: In view of the hysterical outburst from Moscow and the somewhat trivial response of the Secretary of State for Defence to the factual and balanced speeches made by the right hon. Gentleman the Foreign Secretary and myself, will the Prime Minister speak up for the effective defence of Britain and for our way of life against those who permit freedom of neither speech nor travel and who have to build a wall to keep their people in?

The Prime Minister: I agree with the right hon. Lady about the outbursts from Moscow. I thought the best comments on the whole business came from my noble Friend the Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, who told the Russians that this was a country of free speech and that anybody was free to make speeches—including my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence and those Russians who wished to enter the argument. It was quite wrong of the right hon. Lady to refer to any comparison between her speech and that made by my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary in relation to what was said by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence, who spoke from real knowledge of these matters. The right hon. Lady's analysis contained a considerable number of long accepted truths which she has just discovered, but it contained nothing new. The difference between the right hon. Lady and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence is that he has been dealing with these matters from great knowledge, whereas the right hon. Lady has suddenly began to make speeches about them.

Mrs. Thatcher: If the Prime Minister accepts the analysis and accepts that, if our defence is to be effective, it must bear some relation to the forces ranged against us, will he say "No" to further defence cuts?

The Prime Minister: We have a responsibility, as had the Conservative Government of which the right hon. Lady was a member, in making our contribution to NATO. We are making a full

contribution and NATO is extremely satisfied with our contribution. I have made clear in the House that any review of defence expenditure will not affect the effectiveness of that contribution. We have said this to our NATO allies. I am sure that the right hon. Lady will be satisfied with the figures when they are published. I agree with the right hon. Lady's comments about the Berlin wall. I recall a visit made by 40 hon. Members in a Labour Party mission to Berlin many years ago. Some of my hon. Friends who were involved in that visit are still in the House and they will remember the line taken by that mission and its leader in 1962.

Oral Answers to Questions — BELGIAN PRIME MINISTER

Mr. Marten: asked the Prime Minister when he next proposes to meet the Belgian Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister: I have at present no plans to meet M. Tindemans before the next meeting of the European Council on 1st and 2nd April, Sir.

Mr. Marten: Has the Prime Minister read Mr. Tindemans' report and does he recall the reference to direct elections to the European Parliament? Does he agree that before detailed discusssions on this subject are carried very much further the United Kingdom Parliament should be told what powers the European Parliament will have? How can we possibly judge whether it is right or wrong to have direct elections until we know precisely what the powers are? Are we not putting the cart before the horse? Therefore, may we have an assurance that Parliament will be told?

The Prime Minister: The issue of direct elections was settled by the referendum—[HON. MEMBERS: "No".] The referendum ratified the Treaty of Accession, with the changes that we succeeded in obtaining in our renegotiations, and the matter is included in the Treaty of Rome. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has told the House what we intend to do about direct elections. We do not intend to proceed with undue haste, but we are not dragging our feet. We feel it right first to consult the principal parliamentary parties in this


country, as well as the party organisations outside with experience of dealing with some of the technical problems. In other words, we envisage a procedure not unlike that followed in connection with other election proposals.
The idea is that we shall invite parties represented here and parties outside, through their national organisations, to give their views to the Government. We then propose to produce a discussion document in the form of a White, or Green Paper containing all the questions raised, so that all hon. Members and the public can express their views. I agree with the hon. Member for Banbury (Mr. Marten) that before any decisions are taken they should be the subject of debate by Parliament.

Mr. Rose: Does my right hon. Friend agree that accession implies that we accept the principle of direct elections based on the national method of member countries? Does he not also think it rather strange that those who criticise bureaucracy in Brussels should be against the democratic principle of direct elections? Does he not further agree that two years is quite sufficient, in view of our experience in Northern Ireland and with the referendum, to prepare a suitable method of direct elections?

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend has raised a number of questions which go rather wider than I should wish on the implication of views expressed by hon. Members. I have already stated the position on the principle of direct elections. It is, however, extremely important that we get this matter right and I do not believe that any party, the Government, Opposition or anybody else, can claim to know all the answers. That is why we shall welcome consultation and advice, written or oral, from all parties here and from party organisations outside. We shall then prepare a document setting out the main issues that have to be settled, and I hope that it will be debated by the House.

Mr. Thorpe: Has the Prime Minister seen the reported disagreement of his right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary with the two-tier system in Europe suggested by Mr. Tindemans? Does he believe that it would be a bad thing for the Community? Is he aware that there is no need for this system in Great Britain

if we move towards integration economically and politically, at the same pace as all our partners?

The Prime Minister: Of course I support what my right hon. Friend said about the two-tier system. This proposal, which has been aired before, is not one that the Government will support. The real answer is not, as the right hon. Member for Devon, North (Mr. Thorpe) says, to move towards greater integration. We have to catch up the backlog of past events under successive Governments—I am not making a party point—in investment and other matters to ensure that we are highly competitive. This is the task to which the counter-inflation policy, which has now been accepted by the whole country, is working.

Mr. Spearing: My right hon. Friend has said that he thinks that the issue of direct elections has been settled by the referendum. Does he not recall that the 12-page red, white and blue pamphlet put into every letter box during the referendum campaign contained no reference to what the Government are now maintaining is an obligation? As this did not appear in any of those leaflets, on what basis does my right hon. Friend make his claim?

The Prime Minister: The leaflet did not contain the whole text of the Treaty of Rome or the Treaty of Accession. It would have been a very long document if it had. My hon. Friend is being very churlish about the quality of speeches by his right hon. and hon. Friends, hon. Members opposite and himself if he suggests that this issue was never adequately raised in the campaign. It certainly was.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS

Mr. Stonehouse: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You will be aware that this afternoon the Secretary of State for Social Services was unable to answer supplementary questions regarding the provision of National Health Service pay beds for those who come from abroad to take advantage of them—

Mr. William Hamilton: From Australia.

Mr. Stonehouse: From Australia and elsewhere.

Mr. Hamilton: And from Miami Beach.

Mr. Stonehouse: The Secretary of State was unable to answer the supplementary questions because of Question No. 38 which appeared later on the Order Paper. I attempted to forgo that Question so that she could reply, but apparently that was not in order. In view of the interest being expressed in this matter, can the Secretary of State be given an opportunity to reply to that Question now?

Mr. Skinner: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. In considering this matter perhaps you could take into account the fact that it is quite possible that the right hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Stonehouse) will get his pay bed soon enough.

Mr. Speaker: I have had no such request. I am very dissatisfied with the progress made at Question Time today. The Chair has many responsibilities, but unfortunately they do not extend to long-windedness. I wish they did. We have had some very long questions and answers today.

PRICE RESTRAINT

The Secretary of State for Prices and Consumer Protection (Mrs. Shirley Williams): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement on the Selective Price Restraint Scheme.
The House knows that the country is making good progress in the attack on inflation. The £6 pay limit is holding well and, despite a number of particularly unfavourable factors which have pushed up the Wholesale Price Index for industrial inputs in recent months, there are now encouraging signs of real slowing down both in this index and in the Retail Price Index as confirmed by the Price Commission in its Report for the period 1st September to 30th November 1975. Britain is already on course for the target of bringing the rate of price increases down to single figures by the end of the year.
Against this background, I have had discussions with representatives of manufacturers, retailers and others about the introduction of a scheme as promised in paragraph 33 of the White Paper "The

Attack on Inflation". Our objective has been to draw up a list of products on which price increases will be held to a maximum of 5 per cent. both by manufacturers and be retailers for a six-month period starting 1st February and 16th February respectively—in short, to bring forward into the first part of the year, over a considerable area of consumer expenditure, the benefits of the lower rate of inflation which we now expect. I have also consulted the TUC and consumer organisations about the scheme.
During the discussions I have recognised that the profit margins of manufacturers, services and the distributive trades for the third quarter of 1975 were at very low levels and, in certain cases, at their lowest recorded levels, putting at risk both future employment and investment, and that not all the preconditions set in advance for the scheme to come into operation have therefore been met. Nevertheless, representative trade associations of manufacturers and retailers have, in the national interest, agreed to recommend their members to participate in the scheme over a considerable area, amounting to something in the range of 15 to 20 per cent. of consumer expenditure. In practice, as the rate of inflation continues to slow down, there are likely to be many other items in respect of which price increases during the six months concerned will not exceed 5 per cent.
The significant point about the scheme items is that the manufacturers and distributors are prepared to give positive undertakings that this will be the case, because the observance of the pay limit has made it possible for manufacturers to make clear estimates of forward costs. Obviously there are safeguards allowing a firm to withdraw from the scheme—if, for instance, there should be unforeseen increases in raw materials, fuel or taxation.
The undertakings given by United Kingdom manufacturers clearly relate to British made goods only. The scheme will cover some items which are not imported in significant quantities. In cases where imports form a substantial part of the market, the importers have indicated that, while they cannot give definite undertakings about price movements because of currency and duty fluctuations and other factors beyond their control, they


do not expect their selling prices to move significantly out of line with those of home-produced items on the list.
The list of goods within the scheme in some cases covers whole categories of consumer spending, and in other cases particular lines or types of goods. With permission, I will circulate the final list in the Official Report shortly before the scheme begins in the shops. Copies of the letter which the sponsoring Departments have sent to trade associations, the text of which has been agreed between the CBI and myself, are available in the Library. Separately, food retailers dealing in fresh foods, which cannot be brought within the scheme owing to seasonal uncertainties, have agreed to recommend their members to keep margins down on one item of each of the following: meat, one other protein, a fruit and a vegetable during the period of the scheme.
A major publicity campaign will be mounted shortly before the scheme is launched at the retail level in order to make shoppers familiar with the scheme.
I am glad to tell the House that the scheme has the full support of the TUC and consumer organisations. In my view the scheme represents a useful step in our progress towards overcoming inflation. I am grateful to the CBI, the Retail Consortium and other manufacturing, service, wholesale and retail interests for their co-operation in this further stage of the battle against inflation. May I also apologise for the difficulty I have had in presenting this statement to the House.

Mrs. Sally Oppenheim: The House sympathises with the Secretary of State for the difficulty she is encountering in speaking through a heavy cold, and it appreciates the fact that she has felt able to come to the House in the circumstances to make a statement.
Is the right hon. Lady aware that although we accept that those who have participated in the scheme have done so in good faith, even though two of the preconditions have not been met, she has produced nothing more than a cosmetic compromise devoid of the significance which she attributes to it, and that it could perhaps be more effectively described as a selective price increase scheme? Unlike the French scheme, which cut prices by 5 per cent., the Secretary of State's proposals will allow

prices to rise by up to 5 per cent. for goods which might otherwise have fallen considerably in price or might not have risen by as much as 5 per cent.

Mr. Mike Thomas: Which ones?

Mrs. Oppenheim: Sugar. To meet the need for flexibility, the Secretary of State has included a number of exclusions and escape clauses which will dilute the scheme considerably. A number of goods which are mostly sold in specialist shops will be excluded. Will the right hon. Lady say whether the list of items will include foods which are subject to subsidies and which are in any case subject to maximum price regulations? Does the scheme cover nationalised industry prices, which rose last year by no less than 44 per cent.?
How is the scheme to be monitored? Will that be done by the public? If so, whom are they to inform? At whose expense will that be done? The cost of a stamp or telephone call could well come to more than the increase in the price.
How much will the advertising campaign cost, and how much will it cost to issue the little kits to retailers containing the red triangular stickers with which they will proclaim the scheme? How are they to be told whether these have been stuck on the right goods, since in some cases—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Lady is abusing her Front Bench position. This is not the time to make speeches.

Mrs. Oppenheim: Does the Secretary of State expect us to believe that this is anything more than an insult to the intelligence of consumers and trade unionists whom it is designed to impress? What effect will the scheme have on the Retail Price Index?

Mrs. Williams: A scheme which has the agreement of the CBI, the Retail Consortium, the TUC and other manufacturing and service interests—but clearly not the support of the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mrs. Oppenheim)—is one that the hon. Lady ought not to abuse quite so readily. If what she said is true, those who subscribe to it must have done so in a very frivolous spirit. I can assure her that they showed no such spirit.
If the scheme was purely cosmetic, two things would be true. First, it would be likely that the Retail Price Index over the next six months would be at a level below 5 per cent., and I do not believe that anyone accepts that. Second, the scheme would have been very simple to negotiate—and it was nothing of the kind. It anticipates falling costs, and both the CBI and the Retail Consortium have made it clear that this is the only reason why they can participate in it. They believe that the £6 wage limit will now hold for the whole of the first counter-inflation year, and they wish to demonstrate their belief in the counter-inflation policy.
The hon. Lady was wrong about the specialist shops. They will be brought into the scheme, but for a maximum of 60 per cent. of their turnover. There will be a contribution to the scheme by the nationalised industries. Full details will be given as soon as the nationalised boards have been able to confirm it, and I can assure the hon. Lady that whenever a nationalised industry can contribute without the need for an increased subsidy it will do so.
The hon. Lady asked about the monitoring arrangements. The CBI has agreed that leading manufacturers will notify any price changes to the Government for items within the scheme. The Retail Consortium has agreed to provide periodic reports to the Government and to recommend to retailers that they keen a list of base prices immediately before the scheme begins so that inquirers will be able to know whether there have been price changes under the scheme.
On publicity, it has been made clear from the beginning of the discussions that the scheme must be made known to the consumer if it is to serve its purpose. There will, therefore, be expenditure on advertising and publicity, but these will both come within the money which has already been allocated for counter-inflation publicity, and no allowance has been made for an increase in that figure.

Mr. Ioan Evans: In spite of the sour grapes from the Opposition, is my right hon. Friend aware that housewives generally will welcome her statement? Does she realise that, in view of the tremendous response from the trade union movement

on restraining wage demands, there has been an obligation on the Government to restrain prices and that this obligation has been fulfilled?
In considering price restraint, will my right hon. Friend examine the possible representations she will receive from the co-operative movement and the retail trade about a variable rate of VAT? In considering the list of prices which are to be kept down, will she taken another look at cigarettes? It seems illogical to keep down cigarette prices when the Government are trying to restrain people from smoking.

Mrs. Williams: I shall take account of what my hon. Friend said about VAT. He will notice that the trade has indicated that its coming into the scheme depends on there being no unfavourable changes in taxation. I shall bear in mind what he said. The scheme includes offers by manufacturers, and the inclusion of cigarettes reflects one such offer rather than an attempt by the Government to bring cigarettes within the scheme. The 5 per cent. limit will be sparked off only if there is a change in manufacturers' prices. If these do not change, there will be no change in the retail price either. Perhaps I should have pointed that out to the hon. Member for Gloucester when she attacked me.
Of course, 5 per cent. as a minimum is in direct line with the limit on wages, or perhaps it is slightly below it. Therefore, we are trying to bring the largest possible range of necessities into direct relationship with the restraint which people are showing on incomes and on which so much depends.

Mr. Donald Stewart: Is the right hon. Lady aware that this is a pudding which will be tested in the eating, and that that is when we shall pronounce upon it? There will be great regret that no ceiling has been fixed for electricity and other fuels. Since the trade unions were induced to accept a ceiling on pay increases as an alternative to mass unemployment, and since they now have both, how does the Secretary of State expect the scheme to work in the next round if the Prime Minister does not get the right answer he was talking about today?

Mrs. Williams: The hon. Gentleman would be wrong to assume that there will


be no fuel contribution in the scheme. I am not at liberty to give final details until they have been confirmed by the nationalised industries' chairmen. Broadly, there is every indication that price increases in the nationalised industries during the coming calendar year will be far below those of last year. I cannot promise that every individual price increase will be within the 5 per cent. of the scheme, but we shall include in the scheme only three which we are reasonably certain will be below 5 per cent.
I am as conscious as is the hon. Gentleman or anyone any hon. Member of the great perils of high unemployment. The scheme often has to walk a delicate tightrope between doing nothing to encourage the redundancies which I am convinced would follow if we had a complete price freeze in a situation in which costs in the retail trade were still rising and doing everything we possibly can to soften the effects of inflation at a time of income restraint.

Mr. Richard Wainwright: I acknowledge the value of a voluntary scheme, but how does the right hon. Lady take care of the obvious risk in a minority of cases of taking the edge off competition, denying shoppers the benefit of price reductions in some commodities and, above all, establishing a climate in which a universal price increase at the rate of 10 per cent. per annum is considered wholly respectable and inevitable?

Mrs. Williams: There is no provision to move up to the 5 per cent. maximum rate of increase in most cases. There is one exception, which is, rightly, food. In no other case can retail prices move under the scheme unless there is an increase in manufacturers' prices. It is not true that the scheme establishes a minimum as well as a maximum of 5 per cent. There is no reason for some prices in the scheme to move, nor do I believe that they will do so. I have already said that there are a number of items outside the scheme which are likely to stay within the 5 per cent area.
We wanted to give the housewife the benefit of the assurance of stability over a six-omnths' period after a considerable period in which housewives and pensioners have been continually faced with rises in price with no assurance that they

will ever come to an end. I do not want to claim more from the scheme than it gives. It gives us something which the previous adminstration sought but on which they were unable to get agreement.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: Is my right hon. Friend aware that her scheme will be widely regarded by all fair-minded people as a constructive and imaginative counter-inflation measure, infinitely preferable to the policy of the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mrs. Oppenheim) which is to sweep away food subsidies? Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the scheme will be uniformly applicable throughout the United Kingdom to areas such as mine which are peripheral and where there are difficulties about some items of food?

Mrs. Williams: Yes, certainly. We have not included any item which has regional variations in Great Britain which would take it outside the scheme.

Mr. Neubert: As the prices of services provided by the nationalised industries went up by 44 per cent. last year, does not the right hon. Lady agree that the House deserves more direct answers than she has given on this subject? What precise effect will the scheme have on prices in the public sector?

Mrs. Williams: As I have already explained, I am not yet at liberty to give this information, and I do not want to mislead the House by giving provisional information as if it were final. The commercial interests have said that the list is not yet completely finalised, and as soon as it is finalised it will be circulated in the Official Report. That will cover both nationalised industries and the private sector. It is the interests with which I have been negotiating which have said that at the moment they do not want to go beyond the provisional stage.

Mr. Mike Thomas: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, far from regarding the scheme as a cosmetic exercise, large sections of the retail trade, including the co-operative movement, whose interests I represent in the House, are seriously concerned about the way in which the scheme may undermine gross and net margins? What response has my right hon. Friend been able to make to representations on that ground? Does she


accept that the co-operative movement—and, I am sure, the rest of the retail trade—is prepared to go along with the scheme in the national interest but must see some account taken of the difficulties it may create for it?

Mrs. Williams: I am pleased to say that the scheme has been welcomed by the co-operative wholesale and retail interests although emphasis has been placed on what my hon. Friend said about the level of margins. I emphasise how low are those margins in the retail trade. In both the retail food trade and the retail trade, overall the margins are now at their lowest level since the Price Code was introduced. By any standards that is a serious position. Nevertheless, I think the trade recognises, as I do, that the volume of demand in the retail trade is more likely to pick up if there is some assurance that we are moving into a period of relative price stability than if people continue to be frightened about the possibility of greater and greater inflation and, therefore, base their buying patterns on the most cautious possible exercise.

Mr. Giles Shaw: Does the right hon. Lady agree that the scheme will be judged largely on the food sector? Does she also agree that some of the food products she has selected are taxed? Would it not be more sensible for the Government to prepare for a direct reduction in tax on food rather than to

produce the elaborate package which the right hon. Lady has presented this afternoon?

Mrs. Williams: The hon. Gentleman will recognise that the prime food items that are taxed are beer and cigarettes. Although they are not a food, cigarettes are often sold in food shops. One of my hon. Friends pointed out the special difficulties with cigarettes, but I must leave beer to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. We are not unaware that taxation affects the level of certain prices in the food and beer sector although there is no direct taxation on the bulk of food items.

Mr. Raphael Tuck: I warmly commend my right hon. Friend on her statement, but I urge on her the necessity either of containing the price of nationalised industries' services such as coal, electricity and gas or of subsidising those industries. An increase in the price of these services is bound to cause a spate of wage demands.

Mrs. Williams: I recognise how strongly my hon. Friend feels about this matter, but both the CBI and the TUC strongly support the gradual disappearance of subsidies for nationalised industries. Although problems have undoubtedly arisen from the return to viability, I think most hon. Members accept that, as an immediate exercise, it is better for nationalised industries to be viable.

REQUISITIONING OF EMPTY PROPERTIES

3.58 p.m.

Mr. Frank Allaun: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to permit local authorities to requisition houses or flats left empty for more than six months without good reason.
Almost exactly a year ago I sought to introduce a similar though not identical Bill. Permission to do so was given by 223 votes to 204, but no opportunity was provided during the Session to take the Bill any further, although it was printed. As Wilberforce tried for 14 successive years to get through Parliament his Bill to abolish the slave trade, and Fenner Brockway tried for nine years to introduce a Bill to deal with race hatred, before those Bills became law, it seems that there are honourable precedents for sticking at it.
Including Scotland, there are 800,000 empty houses and flats at this moment, many of them having been unoccupied for years. This is a national scandal at a time when the housing situation is so desperate.
Since the first attempt with this Bill, the arguments in favour of it have been greatly strengthened. Many of the homes about which I complained then are still unoccupied twelve months later—indeed, the numbers have increased.
The Labour Party annual delegate conference carried a resolution precisely along these lines. The Association of Municipal Authorities, an all-party body, has sought powers of a rather similar kind. There has been support, in the form of petitions and letters, from all over the country. The Empty Property Group has sent the Minister two lists of addresses of houses which have been empty for long periods—up to 15 years in one case.
It is likely that, in many of the houses so acquired, improvement and repairs would be necessary. This would provide work for many of the 200,000 building trade workers now unemployed.
When a house is left empty, it frequently happens that within weeks children throw bricks through the windows. They climb inside and light fires. Sometimes the house is set on fire,

together with neighbouring houses. Thieves steal the lead from the roof. They also steal the lead piping, with the result that they often cut off the water supply, not only from the house concerned but from a whole terrace of houses. Rubbish is dumped inside, leading to rats, mice, bugs and flies congregating there.
Before long the councils have to brick up the empty houses, or, even worse, have to demolish them entirely. This is an obvious provocation to squatters. In some instances the owner cannot be traced, since he has died, gone abroad or disappeared.
The situation often arises because property owners are holding out for a high selling price or a high rent. In some instances, capital appreciation may more than compensate for the loss of rent on a vacant property, so that the owner is in no hurry either to re-let or to sell, assuming that at some time in the future the market will improve, that the conditions in the area will alter in his favour, or that a change of Government or new legislation will add to the value of his asset.
As an example, I refer to a letter I received last month from a tenants' association in West London. It tells me of a development of 280 flats owned by a well-known property group. Over 50 of these flats are empty. Many have been vacant for over two years. The tenants feel that, if there were requisitioning powers, the owners would be ready to sell the flats at reasonable prices to the council for letting purposes.
In a Written Answer to a Parliamentary Question last month, the Minister told me that
a special examination is now being carried out by Sir Dennis Pilcher and Mr. Derek Wood into the scope for bringing more privately owned property into social use by leasing.
Provided this is not used as a device by landlords to evade the Rent Acts, this might be of some use, but the requisitioning measure would give the back-up power required, as I shall show.
The Answer continued:
But if it becomes clear that we are not making proper headway against the problem of empty homes, then we will not hesitate to consider introducing new and realistic powers to deal with the situation."—[Official Report, 19th December 1975; Vol. 903; c. 899–900.]


It would give me great pleasure if the Government took over the measure and turned those words into deeds—particularly since there have been promises to deal with the problem for several years, without results.
Since the original Bill was published, I have come to the view that owner-occupiers should be exempt from requisitioning in certain circumstances—for example, if the occupant had to go into hospital for six months, or was sent abroad on military service, or went temporarily to look after an invalid living on his or her own. Therefore, I would amend the Bill in the second edition to enable the Secretary of State to give guidance as to making exemptions in these and other cases.
Conservative Members who may consider opposing the Bill must accept the fact that, under both Labour and Conservative Governments, this vast waste of houses has continued. Whatever measures exist to remedy the evil have clearly failed. For example, the survey of short-term letting schemes conducted by the Association of District Councils shows that across the whole country only 100 housing units have been brought into use by landlords who volunteered their empty property for management by the local council. Obviously, stronger measures are necessary.
I know that there are also many council houses kept empty for long periods without good reason. This is equally inexcusable, and I hope that councillors will keep a close watch on this in their own wards. An official of the council housing department should be charged with taking preventive steps to avoid vacancies and gaps caused by premature demolition and premature decanting.
However, there is no financial incentive to councillors, and the number of empty council houses is only one-eighth, approximately, of the empty privately rented or owned properties. They are the main problem.
The chief effect of this Bill would be to give owners of vacant properties an incentive to let or sell them quickly at more reasonable rents or prices and thus to ease the acute housing problem affecting millions of men, women and children. People come before property.

4.8 p.m.

Mr. Nicholas Ridley: Mr. Nicholas Ridley (Cirencester and Tewkesbury) rose—

Mr. Speaker: Is the hon. Member opposing the Bill?

Mr. Ridley: Yes, Mr. Speaker.
I suggest to the House that it should not give the hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Allaun) leave to introduce this Bill. Earlier this afternoon the hon. Member was asking a Question of great interest to Russia. Indeed, he is known as a friend of Russia. I am frightened, on the one hand, that he will get into trouble with his friends there because all the commissars have dachas, and if he tries to pinch them he will get a letter from Mr. Semenov, complaining, as in the case of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, about the conduct and views of a Member of Parliament.
The hon. Member will clearly also offend his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, who, from what we hear, has several empty houses, as have the Secretary of State for the Environment and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. They will not thank him for this measure. But, more important still, he will offend the Minister for Housing, who has had to deal with this suggestion on many occasions before.
On a previous occasion, not only did the Minister say that he had an ancient relative or an old friend who had been unable to sell his house—and, therefore, why should it be requisitioned just because the owner could not find a buyer?—but he produced many administrative and technical reasons to do with the administration of the scheme and to do with the need for an appeals system which in the opinion of the Government meant that the proposals of the hon. Member for Salford, East were not acceptable. I take it that all members of the Government will therefore support me in opposing the hon. Gentleman's having leave to introduce his Bill. We look forward to a massive vote on this occasion.
But the Minister did not give the right reasons for rejecting his hon. Friend's suggestion. The word "requisition" is a military word. It means to take from a town or a part of the countryside horses,


fodder, housing, ammunition and anything else that the Army needs—in other words, just to steal it. The word "requisition" is a military word meaning "steal"—

Mrs. Millie Miller: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) aware that hundreds of thousands of Londoners bombed out during the war had their housing—

Mr. Speaker: Order. That sounds to me like an argument and not a point of order.

Mr. Ridley: If the hon. Member for Ilford, North (Mrs. Miller) will curb her impatience, I shall be coming to the houses in a moment.
The first objection to the Bill is that this is no time for requisitioning. I remember the story of a magistrate who once had to pass sentence on a man convicted of stealing. He asked the prisoner what his job was, and the reply came "I am a draughtsman." The magistrate said to him, "How would you like it if I pinched your bloody draughts?" That is what the hon. Member for Salford, East is trying to do. He is trying to pinch someone else's property. How would he like it if the Tories tried to pinch the funds of the trade unions?

Mr. Thomas Torney: They did.

Mr. Ridley: What will be the encouragement to squatters if the hon. Member for Salford, East is allowed to bring in his Bill?
The general encouragement of disrespect for the law which the hon. Gentleman has sought to bring about is the first moral objection in principle to what he wishes to do. But there is a much more important reason why we should not take this step. That, as the hon. Gentleman himself said, concerns people and not property.
The number of homeless in this country is a disgrace. Since 1950, the number of people in county council care has gone up from 5,500 families to 28,500 families.

That in itself is an appalling reflection upon our ability to house our people. Hon. Members in all parts of the House will know that their constituents are getting more and more desperate about their housing problems. The number of housing problems coming to us increases year by year. It is not just that the private sector is not able to cope. It is that the public sector is totally unable to cope with the masses of people who want State housing.

We have here a very real problem, and we have to ask ourselves why these people are homeless and why there are so many empty houses. The answer to the problem is not the one given by the hon. Member for Salford, East, which is to take the houses for them. The answer is to go to the root cause of the problem, which is Socialism for 55 years.

It was in 1919 that rent restriction was first introduced. Since then, rent restriction has been tightened and council housing has been increased until this year we are spending £4,000 million on subsidies to State housing. The security of tenure regulations have starved off landlords from putting forward their houses for letting and, after all this period of Socialist housing, the homelessness is worse, the human misery is worse and the queues are longer.

On this subject, we have a track record of the effects of Socialism over a long period of time, and to suggest that we should underpin an ailing and failing State housing sector by a further dose of Socialism is to condemn countless hundreds of thousands of families to homelessness, to squalor, to overcrowding and to the miserable council house waiting list which is the only ultimate conclusion of a Socialist housing policy. Therefore, I ask the House to refuse the hon. Member for Salford, East leave to introduce his Bill.

Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 13 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of Public Business):—

The House divided: Ayes 224, Noes 184.

Division No. 36.]
AYES
[4.15 p.m.


Allaun, Frank
Ashton, Joe
Bain, Mrs Margaret


Anderson, Donald
Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Bates, Alf


Archer, Peter
Atkinson, Norman
Bean, R. E.


Ashley, Jack
Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Beith, A. J.




Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Grant, John (Islington C)
Parker, John


Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Grocott, Bruce
Parry, Robert


Bidwell, Sydney
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Pavitt, Laurie


Bishop, E. S.
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Pendry, Tom


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Penhaligon, David


Booth, Albert
Hart, Rt Hon Judith
Perry, Ernest


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Prescott, John


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Hatton, Frank
Price, C. (Lewisham W)


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Hayman, Mrs Helene
Price, William (Rugby)


Buchan, Norman
Heffer, Eric S.
Radice, Giles


Buchanan, Richard
Hooley, Frank
Reid, George


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
Horam, John
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)
Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)


Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)
Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
Roderick, Caerwyn


Canavan, Dennis
Huckfield, Les
Rooker, J. W.


Cant, R. B.
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Rose, Paul B.


Carmichael, Neil
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Rowlands, Ted


Cartwright, John
Hunter, Adam
Sandelson, Neville


Clemitson, Ivor
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Sedgemore, Brian


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
Selby, Harry


Coleman, Donald
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Sillars, James


Concannon, J. D.
Johnson, James (Hull West)
Silverman, Julius


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)
Skinner, Dennis


Corbett, Robin
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Small, William


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
Jones, Barry (East Flint)
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Crawford, Douglas
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)


Crawshaw, Richard
Judd, Frank
Snape, Peter


Cronin, John
Kelley, Richard
Spearing, Nigel


Cryer, Bob
Kerr, Russell
Spriggs, Leslie


Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiteh)
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Stallard, A. W.


Dalyell, Tam
Kinnock, Neil
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Davidson, Arthur
Lambie, David
Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
Lamborn, Harry
Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)


Davies, Denzil (Llane[...]ll)
Lamond, James
Stoddart, David


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)
Stonehouse, Rt Hon John


Deakins, Eric
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Stott, Roger


Dean, Joseph (Leeds W)
Litterick, Tom
Strang, Gavin


Delargy, Hugh
Loyden, Eddie
Swain, Thomas


Delargy, Hugh
Luard, Evan
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)
Thompson, George


Dempsey, James
McCartney, Hugh
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)


Doig, Peter
McElhone, Frank
Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy (N Devon)


Dormand, J. D.
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)
Tierney, Sydney


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
McNamara, Kevin
Tomlinson, John


Duffy, A. E. P.
Madden, Max
Torney, Tom


Dunnett, Jack
Magee, Bryan
Tuck, Raphael


Edge, Geoff
Mahon, Simon
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)


Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
Mallalieu, J. P. W.
Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)


Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)


English, Michael
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)


Ennals, David
Maynard, Miss Joan
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)


Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Meacher, Michael
Ward, Michael


Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert
Watkins, David


Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
Mikardo, Ian
Welsh, Andrew


Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)
White, Frank R. (Bury)


Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
Mitchell, R. C. (Soton, Itchen)
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Flannery, Martin
Molloy, William
Williams, Rt Hon Shirley (Hertford)


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Moonman, Eric
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)


Forrester, John
Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)


Freud, Clement
Newens, Stanley
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Noble, Mike
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Oakes, Gordon
Woodall, Alec


George, Bruce
O'Halloran, Michael
Young, David (Bolton E)


Gilbert, Dr John
O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian



Ginsburg, David
Orbach, Maurice
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Golding, John
Ovenden, John
Mr. George Rodgers and


Gould, Bryan
Owen, Dr David
Mr. Ron Thomas.


Graham, Ted
Padley, Walter



Grant, George (Morpeth)
Park, George





NOES


Adley, Robert
Berry, Hon Anthony
Brittan, Leon


Aitken, Jonathan
Biggs-Davison, John
Brocklebank-Fowler, C.


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Blaker, Peter
Brotherton, Michael


Arnold, Tom
Body, Richard
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)


Awdry, Daniel
Boscawen, Hon Robert
Buchanan-Smith, Alick


Baker, Kenneth
Bottomley, Peter
Budgen, Nick


Banks, Robert
Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Bulmer, Esmond


Bell, Ronald
Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)
Burden, F. A.


Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Braine, Sir Bernard
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)







Carlisle, Mark
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Pink, R. Bonner


Churchill, W. S.
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Jopling, Michael
Prior, Rt Hon James


Clegg, Walter
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Raison, Timothy


Cockcroft, John
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Rathbone, Tim


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Cormack, Patrick
Kershaw, Anthony
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Corrie, John
Kilfedder, James
Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Costain, A. P.
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
Knight, Mrs Jill
Ridsdale, Julian


Dean, Paul (N Somerset)
Lamont, Norman
Rifkind, Malcolm


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Le Marchant, Spencer
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Drayson, Burnaby
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Dunlop, John
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Durant, Tony
Lloyd, Ian
Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Loveridge, John
Royle, Sir Anthony


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Luce, Richard
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


Elliott, Sir William
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Shaw, Michael (Scarborough)


Eyre, Reginald
McCrindle, Robert
Shelton, William (Streatham)


Fairgrieve, Russell
McCusker, H.
Shepherd, Colin


Fell, Anthony
Macfarlane, Neil
Sims, Roger


Finsberg, Geoffrey
MacGregor, John
Sinclair, Sir George


Fisher, Sir Nigel
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)
Skeet, T. H. H.


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
Marten, Neil
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Mather, Carol
Speed, Keith


Fookes, Miss Janet
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald
Spence, John


Fry, Peter
Mawby, Ray
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)


Gilmour, Rt Hon Ian (Chesham)
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Sproat, Iain


Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
Meyer, Sir Anthony
Stainton, Keith


Glyn, Dr Alan
Mills, Peter
Stokes, John


Goodhart, Philip
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Stradling Thomas, J.


Goodhew, Victor
Moate, Roger
Tapsell, Peter


Goodlad, Alastair
Molyneaux, James
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Monro, Hector
Townsend, Cyril D.


Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Montgomery, Fergus
Tugendhat, Christopher


Griffiths, Eldon
More, Jasper (Ludlow)
Vaughan, Dr Gerard


Hall, Sir John
Morgan, Geraint
Wakeham, John


Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)
Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek


Hampson, Dr Keith
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)
Wall, Patrick


Hannam, John
Mudd, David
Walters, Dennis


Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Neave, Airey
Weatherill, Bernard


Hastings, Stephen
Neubert, Michael
Whitelaw, Rt Hon William


Hawkins, Paul
Newton, Tony
Winterton, Nicholas


Higgins, Terence L.
Onslow, Cranley
Wood, Rt Hon Richard


Holland, Philip
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)


Hordern, Peter
Osborn, John
Younger, Hon George


H[...]well, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)



Hurd, Douglas
Paisley, Rev Ian
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Hutchison, Michael Clark
Parkinson, Cecil
Mr. Michael Latham and


Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Pattie, Geoffrey
Mr. Nicholas Ridley.


James, David
Percival Ian

Question accordingly agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Frank Allaun, Mr. Arthur Latham, Mr. Bruce Douglas-Mann, Mr. Arthur Blenkinsop, Mr. Robin F. Cook, Mr. Andrew F. Bennett, Mr. Ron Thomas, Mrs. Audrey Wise, Mr. Dan Jones, Mr. Jim Callaghan, Mr. Mike Noble and Mr. Julius Silverman.

REQUISITIONING OF EMPTY PROPERTIES

Mr. Frank Allaun accordingly presented a Bill to permit local authorities to requisition houses or flats left empty for more than six months without good reason: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 7th May and to be printed. [Bill 45.]

TRADE UNION AND LABOUR RELATIONS (AMENDMENT) BILL

Suggested Amendments

4.28 p.m.

Mr. James Prior: I beg to move,
That, pursuant to the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the House suggests to the Lords the following Amendments to the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill:
Clause 1, page 1, line 8, leave out paragraph (a).
Clause 2, page 1, line 22, at beginning insert—
'( ) At end of section 5(3) of the principal Act (Rights of workers as to arbitrary or unreasonable exclusion or expulsion from trade union) there shall be inserted the words "providing that he has first sought to resolve the matter by using the internal procedures of the union or, where appropriate, the Trades Union Congress"'
Section 5 of the principal Act of 1974 conferred two rights on a trade unionist or worker who was expelled or excluded from a union. First, it afforded him a legal right not to be excluded from membership or expelled from a trade union and second it gave him a remedy, namely a swift and efficient recourse to an industrial tribunal. This Amendment Bill seeks to delete those rights. That is one of the main objections that we have to the Bill.
We have discussed the matter on a number of occasions during the passage of the former Bill, and there is not now a great deal new to say. We are today suggesting an additional amendment.
The worker who is excluded or expelled from a union needs to have a properly constituted legal body to which he can submit his case. Throughout the course of this prolonged discussion we have taken that view. I can do no better than to quote Lord Salmon, who said in another place:
If Section 5 is struck out of the Act, this would strike at the very root of a principle which all my life I have done my best to defend—the principle that the law of England will always protect individual liberty and the basic right of every man not to be unreasonably or arbitrarily prevented from earning his living. It protects every man against any threats or any abuse of power, from whatever quarter those threats may come."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 10th March 1975; Vol. 358, c. 25–26.]
I am sure that few hon. Members do not agree with that principle. Yet we

are removing these rights from the worker and replacing them by a right to be heard by a committee set up by the TUC. There will not be many such cases because few workers are expelled or excluded from a union. When reading the Official Report of debates in another place I noticed that Lord Lee of Newton said that he had been responsible for many years for 30,000 workers, and that he had not come across any such case.
We have always believed that the best way of dealing with the matter would be by giving the right to a properly constituted tribunal. I do not suggest that this view is a reflection on the impartiality of the trade union movement. I believe that the movement is capable of doing the job and that it would do everything in its power to see that the committees were properly constituted and gave a fair and reasonable answer.
I should like to examine in more detail the great responsibilities which the committees will have. We are dealing with the livelihood of a person. We are not just taking away the right to work in one job and conferring on that person the right to work in another job. If a man loses his union ticket he has lost his livelihood. That is not comparable with the number of other cases where there is a right to go to a tribunal. For example, a man claiming unfair dismissal can take his case to a tribunal which decides on appropriate remedies. At least a man claiming unfair dismissal can get another job, but under this arrangement, if a man loses his job he loses his trade union ticket and is unable to get another job. To quote Lord George-Brown:
You cannot tell a man in the docks, or a lorry driver in my own union who wants to operate as a container lorry driver, that he can go and take a lorry driver's job anywhere else. The answer is that he cannot do so. We are pushing things too hard and we are ending by being very mean to the fellows who want to protest."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 10th March 1975; Vol. 358, c. 63.]
We all remember the man who lost his union ticket and ended up scraping the barnacles off Brighton pier. That case might appear slightly entertaining now, but at the time it was serious.
Many moons ago the Secretary of State said that he recognised that a committee or tribunal would be necessary for this


purpose. We believe that at that time he fully expected to introduce a proper provision into the Bill. But obviously the TUC told him that it felt that this was unnecessary. Some people, including Lord Houghton, think that for better or worse, the matter became caught up in the arrangements reached over the social contract.
We are left with a committee appointed by the TUC. That would be valuable to the individual after he had exhausted all internal union procedures, but first the review body would have to have discussions with the union and the individual to try to solve the problem. That could take a great deal of time. If there were no agreement the review body could recommend whether or not the individual was to be readmitted to the union. That would take an enormous length of time and there is no saying whether the union which had expelled or excluded the individual from membership would be prepared to take him back. There is no legal means of insisting that the union reinstates that person. That seems an unsatisfactory way of dealing with what is admittedly a small but important issue.
We have tried to meet the Government's previous objection to our proposals in this matter by inserting the words:
providing that he has first sought to resolve the matter by using the internal procedures of the union or, where appropriate, the Trades Union Congress".
We believe that that goes a long way to meet the objections of the Government and TUC to our previous amendment. We are now saying that all the procedures of the union have to be used first. Only after they have been completed could a case be taken to the tribunal. That would seem to us to be entirely satisfactory.
We have thought very deeply about this. We are not setting out to be offensive to the TUC or to the trade union movement, but we believe that there are deep principles involved.
We recognise that the closed shop is regarded by employers and unions and union members as being the way in which they can best conduct their affairs. It is above all for that reason that we believe that there should be proper legal opportunities open to the individual who feels that under those circumstances he can or might suffer.
The Conservative Party attaches enormous importance to these safeguards. They are safeguards of a minor nature but they are extremely important to any individual concerned. Moreover they are important in respect of the whole attitude that the House and the trade union movement adopt towards the rights of the individual.
I personally believe, and I am certain that my right hon. and hon. Friends agree with me, that the trade union movement will benefit from being seen to take into account at all times the particular rights of the individual and by not needing to look over its shoulder to see whether anyone is trying to undermine its position. It has now reached a position of power and influence so great that it is totally unnecessary for it to feel that by granting legal rights to an individual it is in any way undermining its position amongst its fellow workers or in society generally.
However, hon. Members have rather different duties to perform. We believe that this is a case where the individual's rights should be respected by giving him an opportunity to take a case to the tribunal if he so wishes. That was the whole basis of our amendment when we considered the 1974 Bill. This is a case not of the Government wishing to put the trade unions above the law, but their genuinely believing that the trade unions can organise these matters better than the law. All we are saying in our amendment is that we should let the processes go through but at the end of the day, if they do not succeed, we should then give the last resort right to the tribunal. I do not believe that we could have a more reasonable position than that. I do not believe that I could have put our case in more reasonable and less hysterical language than I have done.
By our amendments to the Bill we are genuinely trying to seek a position in which our industrial relations law can rest for a considerable period. I do not believe that these matters are best decided in this House. However, I do believe that we have a duty to keep a balance between what is right for the trade union movement and what is right for the individual.
Perhaps I should have mentioned earlier that there are about 10 million people who are not members of trade unions and about a million trade


unionists who are not affiliated to the TUC. Again, they do not even have the right at present to take a case to a TUC committee or review body. Therefore, they, too, are being denied any rights.
We believe that what we have written into our amendment is the very minimum required in the circumstances. I believe that my right hon. and hon. Friends will wish to support me on the amendment.

4.45 p.m.

Sir Derek Walker-Smith: As my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) said in his very reasonable and persuasive speech, although the matters in issue here may not arise frequently they nevertheless raise questions of fundamental importance. There is no doubt that the repeal of Section 5 of the 1974 Act will remove from the individual worker a right of substance, indeed of dual substance—the declaration of principle in subsection (1) and the machinery to enforce it in subsection (3). There is no doubt that as a matter of law and practicality the protection thus afforded is, or can be, real and effective.
First, there is the right to put the case to an industrial tribunal, a body combining the qualities of objectivity, impartiality and experience in these and related matters. The extent and scope of its experience can be seen from the catalogue of its jurisdiction contained in paragraph 16 of Schedule 1 to the 1974 Act. If not like Sam Weller's knowledge of London—extensive and peculiar—it is at any rate extensive and specialised. Therefore, the declaration of such a tribunal must of itself be of value. However, it does not end there. It is no mere pious or abstract declaration taking effect only in the context of general well-meaning exhortation. On the contrary, it is a declaration to be adopted, observed, followed and implemented. If it is not so implemented, recourse can be had to the High Court and an injunction will issue under subsection (3). I have no doubt that these matters constitute an effective remedy.
On 9th December 1975 the Secretary of State said that it would be ineffective or inappropriate and a pyrrhic victory because
One cannot expect a man to love his neighbour if the neighbour has set the dog on

him."—[Official Report, 9th December 1975; Vol. 902, c. 246.]
No doubt that is true. We cannot make people love their fellow men by judicial processes any more than we can do so by Acts of Parliament. However, the injured or threatened worker is not seeking a declaration of love. He is not asking for a guaranteed place in the affections of his fellow trade unionists. All he is asking for is the retention of his membership card. Although that may seem an earthy thing compared with the affection of his fellows, it is, after all, what counts.
With or without the love of his fellow workers, in a vast number of cases the membership card—their number will obviously increase with the spread of the closed shop principle—is a worker's passport to employment, the sine qua non of his capacity to earn his bread and butter and that of his family.
Therefore, it is no light act to take so real and valuable a protection from a worker when we are concerned with not only his union membership—an important thing in itself—but with his chances of livelihood. This is sought to be justified partly on the ground that the remedy will not be effective. However, as I have said, that is based on the false premise that the section seeks to enjoin love whereas it seeks only to ensure membership. No doubt many workers would prefer the disapprobation of the union hierarchy and of their fellow rank and file to the deprivation of their livelihood. A worker cannot resent his fellow members dissembling their love if they want to do so, but he can say that the law should not allow them to kick him downstairs.
It is said that this remedy is not necessary because of the common law right and because of the trade union tribunal. With regard to the common law rights, I counted up, I hope correctly, that during the Secretary of State's speech on 9th December he said no fewer than seven times that there was no derogation from common law rights. For the right hon. Gentleman, with all his vivid and varied vocabulary, to say the same thing seven times was in itself an exceptional circumstance. However, he did not identify the rights or analyse their sufficiency. It is true that he made one very significant admission. He admitted their insufficiency to the extent that they do not extend


to exclusion—they deal only with expulsion. The reason for their inadequacy lies in the nature and limitation of the common law rights. They are rights not specifically arising in a trade union context. They are rights, in effect, deriving from the British notions of fair play and the concept of natural pustice—namely, that once a man is admitted to the sodality of his fellows, he should not forfeit those rights without a fair hearing and regard to the rules. The case of Lee versus Showman's Guild in 1952 established that a domestic tribunal, judging a case of expulsion under its rules, must observe the principles of natural justice and may not condemn a man unheard. If it misinterprets the rules, as a matter of law the courts can correct it. But that is as far as it goes.
If the Government's proposal to repeal Section 6 is adopted, the rules will be wholly and solely the concern of the unions. Therefore, they can be drafted to permit expulsion for any cause, however arbitrary it may seem, with no remedy for the expelled member except a hearing in accordance with those same rules. The common law will not give adequate protection if recourse to the tribunal is not open.
The other suggestion to which my right hon. Frend referred concerned the trade union committee or tribunal. I see two basic weaknesses here. The first is enforcement. There are no powers of enforcement. Let us assume that a trade union inquiry found in favour of the individual and the union concerned refused to implement that finding. That is not an extravagant hypothesis. That would be a pyrrhic victory, to adopt the Secretary of State's language.
The second weakness is this: what guarantee is there that a trade union non-statutory tribunal would come to the same conclusion—on the same facts as an objective statutory tribunal? It depends on the rules and procedure which it adopts, and as to that we know nothing. It depends who will be the legal authority appointed to preside, and as to that we know nothing either.
In my view the Trades Union Congress, admirable as it is in its functions, is not a body for trying issues or persons. We do not want to go back to the concept of private courts. Many years ago I

played a modest part in getting rid of private courts on the management side of industry when I assisted in putting the Restrictive Trade Practices Act on the statute book against the opposition of the then Labour Opposition. We got rid of private courts. I should not wish to revert to them in this other context now.
The right rôle for the trade unions is undoubtedly that spelt out in the proviso to the amendment: to make resort to union procedures a condition precedent to seeking an enforceable declaration from an industrial tribunal. That is obviously sensible. In effect, it is an illustration of the general truth that no one should go to law except as a last and necessary resort and until he has exhausted all possibilities of conciliation and accommodation. The amendment puts that in clear and practical terms.
To deny the citizen his basic rights on the ground that such matters must be reserved for private courts and closed corporations is not the language of democracy or the rule of law. It is the negation of freedom and fairness. As such it should be resisted.

Mr. Esmond Bulmer:: I support my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) in his plea for natural justice. I am sure that it will be accepted on both sides of the House that no man should be judge and jury in his own defence. Clearly the trade unions, by insisting that the law be enacted in this form, are in danger of doing themselves a grave disservice and of laying themselves open to the accusation of acting secretly behind closed doors and even of setting up secret courts.
I want to put one point to the Secretary of State. Recently the Home Secretary thought it right to bring forward proposals for dealing with an analogous situation in the police force, because many people—not least Labour Members of Parliament—thought it wrong that police officers should investigate complaints against their colleagues. The Daily Telegraph reported:
Mr. Jenkins has sensibly decided that the independent element should be introduced at a much earlier stage. His scheme is complex, but it is based on the establishment of a strong independent commission which, it would appear, would have the function of deciding, in the light of preliminary investigations by the police


themselves, whether any complaint should be pressed to the point of disciplinary proceedings or simply dismissed. Both members of the public and police officers would have the right to appeal against the decisions of this commission, and such appeals would normally be considered by one of the commission's members who had not hitherto been involved in the case. Most important of all, an appellant, whether from the police or from the general public, could apply to the commission for the right to have disciplinary proceedings heard by a tribunal including two independent commissioners as well as an officer from a different force.
On the face of it, Mr. Jenkins has struck a fair balance between two essential principles. His scheme offers some protection to the police against the badgering to which they are increasingly subject, but it would also import a real element of independence into the judgment of police behaviour.
To import a real clement of independence into the judgment of trade union behaviour is what we seek to do.

Mr. Jonathan Aitken: I rise to follow the excellent speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) because I share his doubts about the real independence of the committees which will be set up by the TUC.
Like my hon. Friend, I am mystified how the Government can speak with one voice on the Police Bill, on which they consistently argue for a genuine independent element to be inserted into tribunals hearing cases which will decide the livelihoods of police officers, and when they come to this Bill can speak with a completely opposite voice and deny that such genuine independence should be inserted into tribunals hearing and deciding whether a man's livelihood should be preserved because of a dispute with a trade union. It is an astonishing example of double standards. I ask the Secretary of State and his right hon. Friends to consider the extraordinary juxtaposition of those two arguments, which are being put forward on two Bills currently being presented by the Government.
I have been serving on the Police Bill Committee, where I have heard Labour Members, one after the other, use almost the identical arguments deployed by Conservative Members during the long debates on this part of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill. In particular, Government supporters in the Police Bill Committee have said that

they wish to cast no aspersions on the fairness of the police but they think it essential that an independent body, which is seen to be independent, should hear cases which decide the future of police officers.
How can the Secretary of State reconcile what he will no doubt say and has been saying for many months with what the Home Secretary has said? I do not believe that he can do so. Are we to have one law for the trade unions and another for the police and everyone else? These double standards cannot be justified. The fact that any attempt to justify them is to be made is, to me, ultimate proof that the right hon. Gentleman has taken on the rôle of Dr. Faustus and has sold his soul to the trade union movement. I strenuously oppose the line that he has taken throughout our debates.

5.0 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Michael Foot): I have recognised myself in many rôles but not in that of Dr. Faustus. However, if I am Dr. Faustus, I do not recognise the hon. Member for Thanet, East (Mr. Aitken) as Helen of Troy.
As the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) said, we have discussed these matters several times before. Our recent debates go far to justify the claim that there is nothing new under the sun. Despite the efforts of some hon. Members to say something fresh on the subject, it might be difficult. I shall do my best, on arguments not dissimilar from those that we have had before, to give answers that are fresh in some degree. But it is inevitable that we cover much of the same ground.
I must interpolate, in the mildest way possible in view of the extremely moderate tone adopted by the right hon. Member for Lowestoft, that the more this debate is similar to our previous debates, the less justifiable it becomes under the procedure of the Parliament Act and the proposals that we make here now. I am not trying to limit debate, but obviously those procedures were designed to enable the Bill to go to the House of Lords in a form that covered the previous discussions and did not extend beyond them. I hope that that can be taken into account as well. However, I repeat that the right hon. Gentleman has sought to initiate this discussion


in a way that promotes the fewest animosities. As a matter of temperament and for other reasons, I naturally welcome such an approach.
I entirely agree that the fact that only a few people might be involved does not mitigate the importance of the principle. If injustice were to be done to a small number, it is right that the House should take that into account. It was John Lilburne who said that what could happen to anyone could happen to everyone. That is the basis of our democracy, preached by the Levellers long before it was understood by most of the rest of the community. I certainly subscribe to it and I do not question that it is right for the House to have spent a long time on this discussion, because it might involve the liberties of individuals.
We believe that our way of protecting those rights is better than what the Conservatives propose, particularly because we have had so recent an example of their attempt to protect rights by those methods. We think that, so far from protecting the individual, they seriously damaged those rights. The right to combine effectively is also an individual right; Conservative Members sometimes misunderstand that. It is the grave invasion of that individual right to combine effectively, incorporated in the 1971 Act, which has led to all the discussions that we have had since and which, we believe, has injured the atmosphere in many of these relationships, and perhaps the position of individual trade unionists as well as the general interest of the trade union movement. We therefore ought to repudiate the existing situation on that account.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: The Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974 has been on the statute book for 16 months. Can the Secretary of State give us even 16 examples of how, in those 16 months, Section 5 has hindered collective bargaining agreements or the rights of individuals to organise or not to organise?

Mr. Foot: As I said at the beginning of our debates, we always thought that cases might arise under Section 5; that was why we wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible. The right hon. Member for Lowestoft has said a number of

times that there have not been many cases and, therefore, we should not worry. There have, however, been some cases, I think, and there could be others. Some cases have been mentioned in the House. I do not want to pronounce on them and, indeed, I have no right to do so at this time, but that provision would allow such cases to arise and we think that there is a better way of dealing with the matter.
However, that is not our only reason for opposing the amendment. It is necessary to study these matters clearly, because Conservative right hon. and hon. Members, including the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith), have not addressed their minds to some of the other aspects to which we have referred. I certainly congratulate the Opposition on having produced the amendment in a somewhat different form. It thus takes into account one, but only one, of our objections to Section 5 of the 1974 Act. By doing so the Opposition come somewhere near justifying their use of the suggested procedure under the Parliament Act, if it is to be invoked, by claiming that they have a series of new issues to raise.
But I cannot persist with these compliments too far, since in one particular the Opposition continue to table amendments in a form which they know to be unacceptable for good legal reasons. Our fundamental objection to Section 5 is that it singles out unions and their members for special liability in law rather than relying on common law and available non-statutory remedies.
The reason why I referred to the non-erosion of the common law so frequently previously was, no doubt, the frequent interruptions on that same subject and the frequent charges which have been made. But I am glad to have the confirmation of the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East that what I said seven times is correct. That is of great assistance in repudiating charges which might come from other quarters. At least they will not be repeated in this House now that I have the right hon. and learned Gentleman's authority for saying that what I have said seven times is right.

Sir D. Walker-Smith: I agreed with the right hon. Gentleman that there was not an erosion of the common law rights


as such, but what I did not agree with was his assessment of its significance, which was the more important aspect of the matter.

Mr. Foot: I understand the right hon. and learned Gentleman's point. I was accepting, gratefully I hope, the first part of what he said, because the charge was that we had eroded common law rights. I am gratified to have the confirmation of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, who knows so much about these matters, that that is not the case. I differ from the right hon. and learned Gentleman over the interpretation of what follows but I am glad to have his confirmation that what I have said seven times—now, I suppose, nine times—is true.
Our fundamental objection, as I said, is that Section 5 singles out unions and their members for special liability in law rather than relying on common law and non-statutory remedies which are available, and hence brings in enforcement procedures and sanctions which have proved unworkable and disruptive in practice. We want to help the individual who has a genuine grievance against a union, not just to provide him with a paper remedy which might worsen his chances of obtaining or keeping union membership or a job.
Secondly, we are genuinely concerned about the drafting of Section 5, particularly subsection (5). I must reiterate for the tenth time that there is no question of this subsection being needed to preserve common law rights or of its repeal restricting those rights. Express statutory authority would be needed to diminish common law rights in any way.
Our objection to the subsection has nothing to do with the common law position. It relates to the unwanted side effects of the drafting upon legal immunities for action in restraint of trade which have existed since 1871.
Briefly, the danger is that the statement in subsection (5), that
Nothing in this section or section 2(5) above shall prejudice … the common law rights of a person
will undermine the legal immunity given by Section 2(5) to trade union members in respect of purposes of their union that are in restraint of trade, and may undermine the legality and enforceability of

union rules that are in restraint of trade. This could remove long-standing immunities across a far wider field than actions at common law concerning expulsion from a trade union, which in any case are based on other grounds for challenging a union's rules or their application. We believe that this is an example of the way in which the Opposition have neglected the other rights which they may be invading by the remedies that they seek to suggest.
An additional factor, apart from the deficiencies of Section 5, which now has to be taken into account is the TUC's willingness to set up an independent review committee with a legally qualified chairman to consider exclusion and expulsion complaints. To retain statutory machinery on top of that would be condemning the machinery and the TUC's genuine efforts to meet what it recognises as a legitimate point of concern before that machinery has had a chance to prove itself in action.
I cannot easily understand the Opposition's refusal to try out new measures, particularly in view of our repeated assurances that we shall take alternative action if that proves to be necessary—our measures, in place of those which the Opposition operated and which proved defective in practice but which they now want to revive.

Mr. Patrick Mayhew: What is the answer to the point that has been repeatedly made about the divergence between the Government's policy in this regard and their policy with regard to the Police Bill?

Mr. Foot: I shall come to that point shortly, if the hon. and learned Gentleman will permit me.
What I wish to establish first is our attitude to the other objections to this Section 5 as the Opposition wish to reinstate it, our objections on some other grounds, and our regret that the Opposition have not understood the importance of the proposal which the TUC has made. I shall make a few comments on that and on the comments made by other speakers in the debate.
What the Opposition now propose is on one sense worse than the position reached when the Bill was previously considered. Let me remind Opposition Members that both Houses of Parliament


had accepted that Section 5 should be repealed without replacement. That is the constitutional position at present. The Opposition no longer appear to recognise the force of the Donovan Commission's support for a union-based tribunal to consider complaints. I am not quite sure whether the reference to "internal procedures" in their amendment is meant to refer to the exact form of the tribunal which the TUC is proposing.
Naturally, I welcome the recognition that union procedures should be used. I trust that the Opposition no longer believe that they would unnecessarily delay matters. However, can they not recognise that adding a statutory complaints procedure capable of further appeal to the High Court on top of union complaints and appeals machinery and any appeals body of last resort which the TUC may set up; and in addition to common law remedies is inviting further appeals against the union procedures decisions from individuals who have not got their way, and that this is at least a reflection on the way that the unions and the TUC would go about conducting their affairs?
It is no good saying that if the union machinery functions properly, there will be no appeals to industrial tribunals or the courts. The insistence on a statutory right of further appeal will produce the very situation in which an individual may find himself permanently excluded from membership, not only because of resentment by unions, but, more probably, because the individual involved will be looking beyond the union machinery to his statutory rights and will not try to reach any agreed solution. The Opposition have not raised any new consideration in debate on these clauses that has not been fully debated previously or that calls for measures different from those we have proposed and what has been accepted by both Houses of Parliament.
5.15 p.m.
The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East started his reference to the independent committee which the TUC is proposing by saying that he had thought that we had reached some agreement originally that we were going to introduce the form of legislative or legal tribunal that he would have preferred and that the TUC had objected and

that I had merely bowed to what the TUC said. That is not the situation at all. There has never been any concealment from the House about what occurred in the whole of these discussions. That is why we have read out quite clearly the propositions with which the TUC came forward. The Government have always taken the view, as I have, partly as a result of what was said in the Donovan Report, that in closed shop situations there have to be some protections, and we wanted to look for the protection which would be most likely to succeed.
Of course, one possibility is the establishment of a legal tribunal. No one disputes that. However, it has all the disadvantages to which I have already referred, and it had great disadvantages in the eyes of the TUC. Therefore, we urged upon the TUC that it should consider the matter afresh in the general discussions that we had.
We made it clear throughout our discussions that we were not negotiating with the TUC in any sense but were having discussions with it and that what would be decided would be decided by Parliament. However, as a result of those discussions the TUC came forward with its proposal for establishing this tribunal, this independent review body, of its own. When the TUC made the proposal, it was certainly not withdrawing some right. One hon. Member spoke as though we were considering here the TUC wishing to establish some secret court and withdrawing some right that previously existed.
What the TUC came forward with was a proposal not that each trade union would be judge in its own cause, in its own position and its own dispute. The trade union movement as a whole is to establish a review body to survey the activities of different unions.
Anyone who knows anything about the trade union movement will know that for historic reasons the individual unions have been quite jealous in protecting their individual procedures and their individual position. None the less, in view of the Donovan Report and all the discussions that have taken place subsequently and the desire of the present Government that we should have some protection in this field, the TUC came forward with a proposal not for saying that each union should be judge in its own cause, but to ensure that there was


some trade union surveillance over the whole scene. The more that that surveillance becomes established and the more it is known to exist, the more it will ensure that these cases, few as they are already, will be fewer still.
Certainly it was in that spirit of trying to protect the position of the individual as well as protecting the position of the trade union movement as a whole that the TUC made its proposition. I believe that the House would be wise to accept that proposition in the spirit in which it was made. It certainly was not made in any grudging, mean or restrictive manner. It was made by the General Council and approved by the Congress because they thought that it was the right approach to the matter in the interests of freedom.

Sir Raymond Gower: Does the right hon. Gentleman concede, however, that there are some advantages with a body which is more detached and less involved over a body set up by the TUC? Can he not see some disadvantages here, even with the best will in the world? I do not make the comparison with the Police Bill that some of my hon. Friends have made, because there is another element there—the public. However, I feel that the right hon. Gentleman is underestimating the advantages of a legal tribunal that is detached and not involved or biased.

Mr. Foot: I understand the hon. Gentleman's case. I am not saying that there is no case for a legal tribunal. I accept that there is a balance of argument.
To reply to the analogy of the police, I think that the hon. Gentleman has hit upon exactly the right point. The police deal with the public at large and the application of the law at large. It would be a ridiculous state of affairs to argue that there should not be any method of independent review in such cases. I entirely agree with my hon. Friends who have been arguing that case in the Committee on which the hon. Member for Thanet, East has been sitting.
We are here concerned with a union dealing with its members. That is very different from the police dealing with the public under the law of the land. It is a misapprehension to try to compare the two procedures.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman in the sense that no one is disputing that this is a proper matter for debate and argument. If it is found after this procedure has been set up under our proposals that it does not prove satisfactory in protecting the individual, Parliament will have to reconsider the matter.
I have never denied the original proposition on which all these debates have been conducted. It is a proposition that is reinforced by the relevant passages in the Donovan Report. I accept that if closed shops are to grow, some protection must be provided. The protection which the Opposition have sought to provide and which they sought to place in the 1971 Act—I notice that the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe) shakes his head, but if he reads Section 65 of the 1971 Act he will see the origin of Section 5 which is now incorporated in the Bill. It has a direct lineal descent. We do not think that it was a successful method. We believe that there is a grave disadvantage because these proposals are now tied up with the operation of that Act.
The operation of the 1971 Act and the encouragement that was given to breakaway unions under it gave an impetus to the establishment of closed shops. It may be that more closed shops are being established because of the experience of many people under the 1971 Act. We are rejecting the legal machinery apparatus which has been proposed under Section 65 and retained under Section 5 in a somewhat different form, and which would still be retained by the amendment even though it provides a further qualification. We are saying that there is a better method and that it cannot ensure merely that when a case arises, the matter shall go to the independent review body.
It may well be that a person who takes his case to the tribunal will have a better chance of reinstatement if he wins his case than he would have under any of the procedures proposed by the Opposition. A complainant suffers the loss of his job. The procedure that we wish to have adopted would offer a better chance to more individuals to get back their jobs. In such cases the TUC would say "We think this chap was wrongly treated and we, the trade union movement, recommend to one of our unions that it reconsiders the matter and takes


back the person who has suffered the injury". We think that this method gives some of the small number of people involved a better chance of reinstatement.
We do not put forward this proposal so that the matter shall be neglected. We do not say that this debate is not of importance. We say that the methods suggested by the Opposition, having been tried and having failed because they involve a series of other implications, should be rejected and that we should give this procedure a fair chance. Let us not start off on the basis that the TUC is approaching the matter in a grudging spirit. In fact, the TUC is seeking to provide a genuine remedy for individuals who might be unjustly treated. It is on those grounds that we think it right for the House to accept our proposal not merely in the interest of trade unionism but in the interests of freedom itself.

Sir Raymond Gower: I take this opportunity to add to my intervention. I submit that ultimately any individual in almost any sphere should have the right of recourse to an impartial tribunal, define it as the right hon. Gentleman will. With the best will in the world, I cannot accept that the TUC can devise a system which gives the complete detachment and impartiality which is so desirable.
Let us remember that these are delicate cases. By their very nature they are likely to cause matters to be distorted, possibly even in the minds of those who set up this machinery. I plead with the right hon. Gentleman not to imagine that this is a sphere in which some separate system is justifiable.
I remember well the action that was taken by some of my right hon. and hon. Friends to get rid of what I felt were in many ways most undesirable private courts which obtained not only in certain industries on the management side, but in certain distributive trades. They involved the enforcement of covenants and matters of that kind. I thought that their removal was a great step forward. It is truly regrettable that the Government have the remarkable idea that there is one sphere in which the broad principles of a statutory independent tribunal shall not penetrate. They seem to take the view that there is this sphere alone in which some other procedure must

obtain. They believe that this is the one sphere in which we can safely leave the individual to a separate procedure.
I do not think that that is correct. A citizen of this country should be able to have recourse to the courts in all respects. The individual should have that final right. Whatever their failings, our courts have established standards which have been admired internationally.

Mr. Patrick Mayhew: I cannot hide my disappointment at the manner in which the right hon. Gentleman sought to answer the point raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) and Thanet, East (Mr. Aitken), the point of which I reminded him by means of an intervention. When the right hon. Gentleman came to deal with the matter, it was only to say that inquiries into complaints against the police and inquiries of the type we are considering in the trade union context are quite different. He said that inquiries into complaints against the police were different because they involved a policeman alleged to have done wrong in the course of administering the law of the land to an ordinary member of the public. I do not see that the distinction is fundamental or even important.
In each case we are concerned with an investigation into an alleged wrong. There is, indeed, the distinction that in a trade union inquiry of the sort with which we are dealing the wrong may very well be infinitely more serious than many wrongs alleged to have been suffered by an individual complaining against the police. In the trade union context the wrong often amounts to an individual losing his ability to earn his living.
I shall explore briefly the nature of the Government's argument concerning the police that they are pushing forward today. They say that they do not make any aspersions against the integrity of police officers, still less against the integrity of senior police officers who investigate such complaints. But they think that on the whole justice will be better seen to be done if an independent tribunal is substituted for the present arrangements.
That is what is wrong with the Government's argument. Under the present police procedure, in most cases a senior


police officer, often a chief constable, is brought in from a totally different force. But there is a distinction when he comes to make his finding and recommendation. If he makes a disciplinary recommendation, it is in practice treated as binding on the police officer who is being investigated. In the case that is now before us, there is to be no sanction if a union into which the TUC has made an investigation, under a procedure of which we as yet know nothing, disregards a finding and—to put the matter vulgarly—if the trade union against which a finding is made puts up two fingers to the TUC. If that happens, there is nothing that can be done.
5.30 p.m.
What is wrong with the right hon. Gentleman's argument in rejecting our proposals is that the Gvernment's attitude is inconsistent. When dealing with the police their view is "One cannot rely on the procedure affecting the police, however strong our confidence in their integrity." In this case they take the view "We can rely on the TUC to set up its own procedure and to operate it effectively."
The Secretary of State was also defective in his argument that our proposals should be rejected because they tended to make the trade unions a special case. Such a procedure, he said, does not apply anywhere else. Yet if the procedure does not work, the Government will, he says, themselves intervene. Indeed, the TUC procedure itself will make the unions a special case. In this respect, too, the right hon. Gentleman's argument falls flat.
My hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, East was right to say that there was much reminiscent of St. Faustus in the position of the Secretary of State. But I believe that the right hon. Gentleman was right in saying that the trade unions had not introduced the procedure in a grudging, reluctant, or restrictive way. They have no need to do so: they already have what they want and they are only concerned to put a cosmetic gloss on the procedure.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I wish to take up the analogy that has been drawn between the proposed procedure and that adopted when investigating complaints against the police. The Secretary of State for

Employment said that the difference was that the police complaint procedure involved the public, whereas the trade unions would be dealing with complaints made by members.
As I understand the situation, Section 5 of the 1974 Act relates to the situation of persons who may be excluded or expelled from membership. The end result for the individual may be that he will find himself no longer a member of a trade union, and in that sense he will become a member of the public at large. The only difference is that because of action taken, he may lose his livelihood.
No doubt the view one will get from reading the Secretary of State's remarks in Hansard tomorrow will be that the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about possible resentment caused within the unions if these matters cannot be handled within the TUC procedure and internally within the unions, with an opportunity for the matter to be taken further to an independent tribunal. By the same token, is it not possible that a police officer may resent the fact that a member of the public can go to independent arbitration in pursuing a complaint? Therefore, should we not expect an individual policeman to be somewhat resentful vis-à-vis an ordinary member of the public who may take advantage of an independent review?
We have not yet seen the TUC review body and we do not know its terms of reference. That body may work in exactly the same way as the Labour Party National Executive Committee works when it reviews cases of members who might be expelled. So far as I can understand the analogy, such an investigation might be restricted to cases concerned with whether the rules have been operated. The crucial difference arises in cases where, as a matter of natural justice, a person accepts the existence of union membership agreements. However, Section 5, considered with the impact of union membership agreements, creates dangers for the individual.

Mr. John Stokes: I wish to make a brief intervention. I wish to apologise to the Minister since I missed the earlier part of his speech.
I have spent the greater part of my life in personnel work and I regard these provisions as among the most important


we have discussed in the House. I am sorry to see so few hon. Members present, particularly on the Government side, when we are discussing matters touching the liberty and livelihood of millions of people.
If I understand aright the arguments advanced by the Secretary of State for Employment they amount to the plea that where possible the Government wish to give a right of redress to ordinary people. We know that similar considerations arise in the Police Bill. In that instance the Government are going to great lengths to see that justice is seen to be done. We are here concerned with an even more important consideration—namely, a man's livelihood, which of course may put at risk the interests of his wife and children.
It appears that the Secretary of State believes that trade unions are more important than the barons of old who had the right to be charged in their own House. That situation—perhaps alas—has been changed. Now the new barons are the trade unions. They are to be above the law and are to be judge and jury in their own cause. It is absurd that at the end of this whole façade we shall find that there is no redress against a recalcitrant union. What happens when after the case is taken up by the TUC, the union is found to be wanting? So far as I can see, nothing will happen. It is rather like being seen by the Chief Whip.
I am deply disappointed that the Secretary of State for Employment, who has been such a great defender of the people's liberties, has taken the present course.

Mr. Barney Hayhoe: Of all the provisions of a very bad Bill the present provision, which seeks to remove a vital safeguard of individual liberty, is probably the worst, the most squalid and the meanest.
In our many debates on this subject no case in logic, in practice, or in fairness has been made out for eliminating the right of appeal to an independent tribunal against arbitrary exclusion or expulsion from a trade union. The overwhelming weight of argument supports our amendment. This has been true of our past debates and it is equally true today.
Arguments have been linked with the complaints procedure in respect of the police. My hon. Friends the Members for

Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) and Thanet, East (Mr. Aitken) have made interesting contributions on that topic. The analogy with the police is fair, and it demonstrates that different standards are being pursued by the Government in the two kinds of complaint. It is indefensible for Her Majesty's Ministers to adopt such an attitude.
The Secretary of State acknowledged the weighty contribution by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith). I wish that the Secretary of State would listen to that contribution and act upon it. My right hon. and learned Friend's words were of immense importance in relation to common law rights and natural justice. His contribution buttresses the views expressed in another place by Lord Salmon who, in an extremely powerful speech, said:
It is impossible to consider Section 5 in isolation. If Section 6 goes"—
Section 6 will be the subject of the next motion that we shall be considering—
the rules of a Communist dominated trade union—if ever such a union came into being—could be amended to allow the Executive to do what it likes, irrespective of the rules of natural justice.
That was the point made by my right hon. and learned Friend.
Indeed the repeal of Section 6 might well be regarded as a mandate to make such an Amendment. If this should happen, the common law, in my considered opinion would be entirely powerless to protect the working people of this country against oppression.
Those words come from one of the most senior and well-respected legal luminaries in the land. In the face of that most powerful statement, the Government are proceeding without even attempting to argue their position. All they have done is to repeat again the rather formalised drafting which, no doubt, has been prepared by some backroom legal worker. No doubt it sets out the position with accuracy, but in only the most limited sense and without appreciating the subsantial issues involved.
Lord Salmon concluded:
I beg your Lordships not to allow Section 5 to be swept away,"—
If he were here, he would be asking hon. Members to support our suggested amendment—
because it is in the end the only effective protection which the ordinary man on the


shop floor would have in the circumstances I have postulated. If it goes, it could well herald the beginning of the end of individual liberty".—[Official Report, House of Lords, 10th March 1975; Vol. 358, c. 28–29.]
These are observations which cannot be lightly set aside. I am sorry that the Secretary of State and the Government have not been prepared to find a way of meeting the reasonable point of view put in this House and outside, a view which has attracted much support from people of other parties and of none.
The Secretary of State criticised the fact that arguments on this matter were being repeated, but surely it is not unreasonable for us to repeat arguments which we believe to be soundly based and very important. The Government have managed about turns in other matters. Why can they not do an about turn on this issue?
The Secretary of State said that the right to combine effectively was involved. As ever, he misrepresented the 1971 Act by saying that it jeopardised that right. He is not sustaining the right to combine, but the right for individuals to be compelled to combine. If, having joined in combination with others, they are then arbitrarily expelled, they will have no right of independent appeal. The right to appeal to an independent tribunal has existed in its present form for 18 months. It has not been used very often, but lack of use is no argument for its elimination.
Experience has taught us a much more important lesson. The existence of this right has not led to the difficulties forecast by the Secretary of State in such emotive terms in earlier debates. The dire consequences which he forecast with such certainty have not happened. The Government were wrong. Why do they not have the spunk to admit their error and to accept the amendment?

5.45 p.m.

Mr. Foot: Lord Salmon's remarks will be dealt with by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State on the next amendment. They refer more particularly to that amendment. However, I should not like the occasion to pass with anyone imagining that the Government accept what Lord Salmon said.
We think that he used hysterical language, and the hon. Member for Brentford

and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe) confirmed that when he referred to Lord Salmon talking about individual liberty being destroyed in this country if this protection were not sustained. The hon. Member then had to admit that this supposed protection had been in existence for only 18 months. Presumably individual liberties had been in jeopardy before that.
We are not restoring a position which is unknown to the law and liberties of this country. We are restoring a situation which prevailed before 1971. It is a hysterical language to say that individual liberty was in jeopardy all that time because this form of tribunal inherited from the 1971 Act was not in operation. We are not merely restoring the situation; we are making one notable addition in the interests of freedom. We are adding the independent review body.

Mr. Leon Brittan: We are not making any such addition. Parliament is not making the addition. We are living in hope that an outside body will do so.

Mr. Foot: The hon. Member's hopes would already have been realised if it had not been for the interference of another place. The body would already have been established.
The Government are not proposing any derogation from the liberties of this country which existed before 1971. We are living in the hope and expectation that we shall soon have—and we have undertaken to secure—the addition of an independent review body established by the trade union movement. It will be the same kind of body as that suggested in the Donovan Report.
The trade union movement adopted many of the Report's suggestions of its own accord during the two or three years following its publication. A proposal was made in the Report similar to that which the trade union movement proposes to adopt as an additional protection and precaution. In the light of that situation, anyone who uses the kind of language used by Lord Salmon is misleading the people of this country in a grotesque manner, and even eminent lawyers in another place should be more careful of their language.

Mr. Prior: I think that it was Solzhenitsyn who said about this country recently:
It is not your freedom I mind, but the way you surrender it step by step.
This is exactly what we have been doing over the past few years. If the Secretary of State thinks that the position in Industrial

trial relations in this country is the same as it was a few years ago, he is not living in the world in which he should be living. Basic individual liberties are affected in this matter.

Question put:

The House divided: Ayes 254, Noes 280.

Division No. 37.]
AYES
[5.50 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Freud, Clement
McAdden, Sir Stephen


Aitken, Jonathan
Fry, Peter
McCrindle, Robert


Alison, Michael
Galbraith, Hon T. G. D.
McCusker, H.


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Gardiner, George (Reigate)
Macfarlane, Neil


Arnold, Tom
Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)
MacGregor, John


Atkins, Rt Hon H. (Spelthorne)
Gilmour, Rt Hon Ian (Chesham)
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Farnham)


Awdry, Daniel
Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)


Baker, Kenneth
Glyn, Dr Alan
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)


Banks, Robert
Godber, Rt Hon Joseph
Madel, David


Bell, Ronald
Goodhart, Philip
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)


Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Goodhew, Victor
Marten, Neil


Benyon, W.
Goodlad, Alastair
Mather, Carol


Berry, Hon Anthony
Gorst, John
Maude, Angus


Biffen, John
Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald


Biggs-Davison, John
Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Mawby, Ray


Blaker, Peter
Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin


Body, Richard
Gray, Hamish
Mayhew, Patrick


Boscawen, Hon Robert
Griffiths, Eldon
Meyer, Sir Anthony


Bottomley, Peter
Grist, Ian
Mills, Peter


Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Grylls, Michael
Miscampbell, Norman


Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)
Hall, Sir John
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)


Braine, Sir Bernard
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Moate, Roger


Brittan, Leon
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Molyneaux, James


Brocklebank-Fowler, C.
Hampson, Dr Keith
Monro, Hector


Brotherton, Michael
Hannam, John
Montgomery, Fergus


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
More, Jasper (Ludlow)


Bryan, Sir Paul
Hastings, Stephen
Morgan, Geraint


Buchanan-Smith, Alick
Havers, Sir Michael
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)


Budgen, Nick
Hawkins, Paul
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)


Bulmer, Esmond
Hayhoe, Barney
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)


Burden, F. A.
Heath, Rt Hon Edward
Mudd, David


Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Hicks, Robert
Neave, Airey


Carlisle, Mark
Higgins, Terence L.
Nelson, Anthony


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Holland, Philip
Neubert, Michael


Churchill, W. S.
Hooson, Emlyn
Newton, Tony


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Hordern, Peter
Normanton, Tom


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Howell, David (Guildford)
Nott, John


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Onslow, Cranley


Clegg, Walter
Hurd, Douglas
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally


Cockcroft, John
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Osborn, John


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)


Cope, John
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Paisley, Rev Ian


Cormack, Patrick
James, David
Parkinson, Cecil


Costain, A. P.
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Pattie, Geoffrey


Crouch, David
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Penhaligon, David


Crowder, F. P.
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Percival Ian


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Dean, Paul (N Somerset)
Jopling, Michael
Pink, R, Bonner


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Powell, Rt Hon J. Enoch


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Drayson, Burnaby
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Prior, Rt Hon James


du Cann, Rt Hon Edward
Kershaw, Anthony
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Dunlop, John
Kilfedder, James
Raison, Timothy


Durant, Tony
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)
Rathbone, Tim


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Elliott, Sir William
Knight, Mrs Jill
Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Emery, Peter
Knox, David
Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)


Eyre, Reginald
Lamont, Norman
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Fairbairn, Nicholas
Lane, David
Ridley, Hon Nicholas


Fairgrieve, Russell
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Ridsdale, Julian


Fell, Anthony
Latham, Michael (Melton)
Rifkind, Malcolm


Finsberg, Geoffrey
Lawrence, Ivan
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Fisher, Sir Nigel
Lawson, Nigel
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Fookes, Miss Janet
Lloyd, Ian
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)
Loveridge, John
Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


Fox, Marcus
Luce, Richard
Royle, Sir Anthony




Sainsbury, Tim
Stanbrook, Ivor
Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)


St. John-Stevas, Norman
Stanley, John
Wakeham, John


Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)
Steel, David (Roxburgh)
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Shelton, William (Streatham)
Stokes, John
Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)


Shepherd, Colin
Stradling Thomas, J.
Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek


Shersby, Michael
Tapsell, Peter
Wall, Patrick


Silvester, Fred
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)
Walters, Dennis


Sims, Roger
Tebbit, Norman
Weatherill, Bernard


Sinclair, Sir George
Temple-Morris, Peter
Whitelaw, Rt Hon William


Skeet, T. H. H.
Thatcher, Rt Hon Margaret
Winterton, Nicholas


Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)
Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy (N Devon)
Wood, Rt Hon Richard


Smith, Dudley (Warwick)
Townsend, Cyril D.
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)


Speed, Keith
Trotter, Neville
Younger, Hon George


Spence, John
Tugendhat, Christopher



Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)
van Straubenzee, W. R.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Sproat, Iain
Vaughan, Dr Gerard
Mr. Spencer Le Marchant and


Stainton, Keith
Viggers, Peter
Mr. John Corrie.




NOES


Allaun, Frank
Duffy, A. E. P.
Jenkins, Rt Hon Roy (Stechford)


Anderson, Donald
Dunnett, Jack
John, Brynmor


Archer, Peter
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)


Armstrong, Ernest
Eadie, Alex
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)


Ashley, Jack
Edge, Geoff
Jones, Barry (East Flint)


Ashton, Joe
Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
Jones, Dan (Burnley)


Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Judd, Frank


Atkinson, Norman
Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
Kaufman, Gerald


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
English, Michael
Kelley, Richard


Bain, Mrs Margaret
Ennals, David
Kerr, Russell


Bates, Alf
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Kilroy-Silk, Robert


Bean, R. E.
Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
Kinnock, Neil


Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
Lambie, David


Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Lamborn, Harry


Bidwell, Sydney
Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
Lamond, James


Bishop, E. S.
Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Flannery, Martin
Leadbitter, Ted


Boardman, H.
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Lever, Rt Hon Harold


Booth, Albert
Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Ford, Ben
Loyden, Eddie


Boyden, James (Bish Auck)
Forrester, John
Luard, Evan


Bradley, Tom
Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Lyon, Alexander (York)


Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)
Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Freeson, Reginald
McCartney, Hugh


Buchan, Norman
Garrett, John (Norwich S)
MacCormick, Iain


Buchanan, Richard
Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
McElhone, Frank


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
George, Bruce
MacFarquhar, Roderick


Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)
Gilbert, Dr John
McGuire, Michael (Ince)


Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)
Ginsburg, David
Mackenzie, Gregor


Campbell, Ian
Golding, John
Mackintosh, John P.


Canavan, Dennis
Gould, Bryan
Maclennan, Robert


Cant, R. B.
Gourlay, Harry
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)


Carmichael, Neil
Graham, Ted
McNamara, Kevin


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Madden, Max


Cartwright, John
Grant, John (Islington C)
Magee, Bryan


Clemitson, Ivor
Grocott, Bruce
Mahon, Simon


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Mallalieu, J. P. W.


Coleman, Donald
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Marks, Kenneth


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Harper, Joseph
Marquand, David


Concannon, J, D.
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)


Conlan, Bernard
Hart, Rt Hon Judith
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Mason, Rt Hon Roy


Corbett, Robin
Hatton, Frank
Maynard, Miss Joan


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
Hayman, Mrs Helene
Meacher, Michael


Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)
Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert


Crawford, Douglas
Heffer, Eric S.
Millan, Bruce


Cronin, John
Henderson, Douglas
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)


Crosland, Rt Hon Anthony
Hooley, Frank
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)


Cryer, Bob
Horam, John
Mitchell, R. C. (Solon, Itchen)


Cunningham, G. (Islington S)
Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
Molloy, William


Cunningham, Dr J. (Whit[...]h)
Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
Moonman, Eric


Dalyell, Tam
Huckfield, Les
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)


Davidson, Arthur
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick


Davies, Denzil (Llanell[...])
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Newens, Stanley


Deakins, Eric
Hunter, Adam
Noble, Mike


Dean, Joseph (Leeds W)
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Oakes, Gordon


Delargy, Hugh
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)
Ogden, Eric


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)
O'Halloran, Michael


Dempsey, James
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian


Doig, Peter
Janner, Greville
Orbach, Maurice


Dormand, J. D.
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Ovenden, John







Owen, Dr David
Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)


Padley, Walter
Sillars, James
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)


Palmer, Arthur
Silverman, Julius
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)


Park, George
Skinner, Dennis
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)


Parker, John
Small, William
Ward, Michael


Parry, Robert
Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)
Watkins, David


Pendry, Tom
Snape, Peter
Weetch, Ken


Perry, Ernest
Spearing, Nigel
Wellbeloved, James


Prescott, John
Spriggs, Leslie
Welsh, Andrew


Price, C. (Lewisham W)
Stallard, A. W.
White, Frank R. (Bury)


Price, William (Rugby)
Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
White, James (Pollok)


Radice, Giles
Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)
Whitlock, William


Reid, George
Stoddart, David
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Stonehouse, Rt Hon John
Williams, Alan (Swansea W)


Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)
Stott, Roger
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Robertson, John (Paisley)
Strang, Gavin
Williams, Rt Hon Shirley (Hertford)


Roderick, Caerwyn
Strauss, Rt Hon G. R.
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Rodgers, George (Chorley)
Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Rodgers, William (Stockton)
Swain, Thomas
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)


Rooker, J. W.
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)


Rose, Paul B.
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Rowlands, Ted
Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Sandelson, Neville
Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
Woodall, Alec


Sedgemore, Brian
Thompson, George
Woof, Robert


Selby, Harry
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)
Wrigglesworth, Ian


Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)
Tierney, Sydney
Young, David (Bolton E)


Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)
Tinn, James



Shore, Rt Hon Peter
Tomlinson, John



Short, Rt Hon E. (Newcastle C)
Torney, Tom
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Short, Mrs Renée (Wolv NE)
Tuck, Raphael
Mr. James A. Dunn and


Silkin, Rt Hon John (Deptford)
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.
Mr. Laurie Pavitt.

Question accordingly negatived.

6.0 p.m.

Mr. Brittan: I beg to move,
That, pursuant to the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the House suggests to the Lords the following Amendment to the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill:
Clause 1, page 1, leave out lines 10 to 15.
The amendment seeks to delete from the Bill a provision repealing the requirement that the rules of a trade union or employers' association must comply with certain basic requirements. Before coming to the substance of my argument I wish to say a word about two peripheral matters that have arisen during the debates.
The first matter is the strange doctrine that the Secretary of State appeared to be propounding during the last debate that we were entitled only to put forward new matters for the consideration of the House this time round and that the intervention of the House of Lords in the last Session circumscribed our right to deal with the Bill. The Secretary of State should know that that is a constitutionally false doctrine for which there is no warrant. What the other place has done has had the effect of requiring this legislation to be put forward de novo in a way which entitles the Opposition fully to argue every point. The moment when we shall cease arguing those points is not when a novel constitutional doctrine of that sort is propounded by the Secretary

of State but when we are persuaded by the arguments which he puts forward, and we have a long way to go before that moment comes.
My second peripheral point concerns the attack on Lord Salmon made in the preceding debate, an attack which is relevant to this debate as well because Clause 6 at least as much as Clause 5 was dealt with by the noble Lord in his speech. It is obvious from the intemperate language that the Secretary of State felt it proper to use about Lord Salmon that what the noble Lord said elsewhere stung the Secretary of State and his point went home. Those who have relied upon Lord Salmon for the protection of their rights have found that those rights have been well and truly protected. Those who have had to rely on the Secretary of State for the protection of their rights have found that they have no rights. It is on that basis that I put forward the amendment.
The powers of the trade union movement are great and are accepted to be great, and nobody objects to their being great. The amendment seeks to recognise that, at the same time, there is a degree of responsibility incumbent upon the trade union movement in accordance with the size of its powers, and that it is reasonable that there should be very limited requirements concerning the rules of trade unions, not as to content but as to subject matter.
Whatever myths the Secretary of State may seek to create relating to other matters, the idea of limited legal requirements for the subject matter of trade union rules is not an invention of the Industrial Relations Act 1971. It dates back fully a century before that Act to the 1871 Act. Paragraph 648 of the Donovan Committee's Report conveniently sets out the requirements that were in existence largely as a result of the 1871 Act. The relevant part of the paragraph is as follows:
The current requirements as to the rules of a registered trade union are that they should 'contain provisions in respect of' certain matters, which are in short:

(a) name and place of business;
(b) objects, purposes for which funds may be applied, conditions of any assured benefits, and any fines and forfeitures;
(c) manner of making and altering rules;
(d) appointment and removal of a general committee of management, a trustee or trustees, treasurer and other officers;
(e) investment of funds and periodical audit;
(f) inspection of the books and names of members by persons having an interest in the funds;
(g) manner of dissolution."

When the Donovan Committee continued to look at the provisions for trade union rules, it came to the conclusion that, accepting that the degree of supervision required by the rules that Parliament had already enacted should continue, it was not sufficient and it was necessary to lay down further requirements as to the subjects which trade union rules should by law be required to deal with. They are set out in the Donovan Report. The effect of the amendment is to write within the body of the statute law the 1871 requirements as to trade union rules and to add to them, and to keep added to them, the further requirements that Donovan recommended, which are to be found in the 1974 Act.
It was said in the course of the debates last Session that it was unnecessary to add to the 1871 requirements the recommendations of the Donovan Report because the trade union movement, as a result of publication of the Donovan Report, had itself specified, at the Croydon congress, requirements as to the subjects to be covered by trade union rules which went beyond the Donovan

Report and were more stringent than the Donovan Report.
It seems to us that is not a sufficient argument against the implementation of the rules recommended in the Donovan Report, because there are two points that arise. First, it seems to us that there should be a fall-back position. The trade union movement has advanced—we accept, recognise and welcome that advance—as a result of the recommendations in the Donovan Report.
It is, however, possible for institutions, even great institutions, to fall back and to retreat, and we think it reasonable that the statutory fall-back of the requirements specified in the Donovan Report should be included and retained, irrespective of the fact that the trade union movement seeks to impose more stringent requirements on its members' rules.
Secondly, what is the position concerning unions which are not members of the TUC? There is no possibility of obliging them to have requirements more stringent than those recommended by Donovan merely because the TUC makes a recommendation to that effect. It is surely in the interests of trade unionism as a whole that the requirements at least of Donovan as enacted in the 1974 Act should be retained.
The other arguments—put forward principally, if my recollection is right, by the Minister of State—was that if one enacted, or allowed to remain on the statute book, requirements as to rules such as are to be found in the 1974 Act, which fall short of the more advanced requirements imposed by the Trades Union Congress, the effect of that would be that the rules required by the statute would become a norm and that the more stringent requirements that the TUC sought to impose would not be followed.
We find that an extremely difficult argument to support. We do not see any reason at all why a body that is proceeding in an advanced way, as the Minister of State has described, would wish to fall back on a statutory position.
There are many cases in which a statute prescribes a minimum and in which the best practice of the organisations concerned goes well beyond what is provided by the statute. It is a century-long accepted procedure for this House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to lay down minimum requirements as to trade union


rules, and, indeed, as to the rules of employers' associations, which under Section 6 are treated in exactly the same way.
In deciding how far we should go—not in prescribing the contents of the rules but in prescribing the matters with which the rules should deal—we have to draw a balance. On the one hand it is accepted that the union rule books have much improved in recent years, but against that we have to take into account the fact that the rôle of the trade unions—and the importance, therefore, of their having proper rule books—has increased and is still increasing.
We believe that, when that balance is drawn, the requirements set our in Section 6 of the 1974 Act are not unduly onerous, are not unfair and, indeed, are not unreasonable. The question to be asked is whether they are an undue intervention in trade union affairs or whether they act as a minimum standard, supporting the trade union movements attempts to impose superior rule books, so to speak, and providing a fall-back.
6.15 p.m.
What is the basis of the objection to the requirements of the l474 Act? Let us see what the 1974 Act requires that is regarded as being so objectionable. The rules must specify the name of the trade union or employers' association, its address and its objects. I do not believe for one moment that that could be regarded as anything other than an innocuous requirement.
The rules must make provision as to the purposes for which, and the manner in which, any property or funds are to be applied or invested. That is a protection for the benefit of members against possible misuses, which can occur in any human institution. It is not an onerous requirement imposed by Parliament at the expense of the trade union movement.
Here, as in all other matters, the rules that Parliament requires are not that the funds should be handled in any particular way, or that they should be used for any particular purpose, but merely that the trade union or employers' association should be required to specify in its own rules, in exactly the way it wants, what those purposes are and how the property is to be applied or invested The union or employers' association has the widest

possible discretion. All that it has to do is to lay down in its rules, for the benefit of its owns members, what the rules relating to these matters are to be.
The 1974 Act, which the Government would seek to repeal in this respect, provides in Section 6(4) that
If any financial benefits are to be available for members of the trade union or employers' association out of its property or funds the rules must make provision as to the amounts of those benefits and the circumstances in which they are to be available to members.
That, surely, is no more than a requirement to ensure elementary financial probity.
The Act then goes on to require that
The rules must specify the manner in which any rules … can be made, altered or revoked.
Is not that, too, an elementary constitutional provision? It does not say that the rules have to be altered by a two-thirds' majority. It does not prevent a union, if it is so minded, deciding that the rules can be changed by the casting vote of the chairman exercised on a Tuesday morning on Bridlington beach. Anything like that is permissible. All it requires is that the union should say—so that its members can know—how the rules can be changed. The members are not then taken by surprise by some clique that has managed to get hold of the union, abstract the rules and arrange for them to be changed in some hole-in-the-corner way.
I am not suggesting that that is likely to happen. All I am saying is that the requirement is designed to prevent that by making it known, above all to the members concerned, what are the rules relating to that matter.
The next requirement is that
The rules must make provision for the election or appointment of officers and for the manner in which officers can be removed from office.
The same comment applies but even more vividly. Let it be observed that with an institution as important as a trade union it might be thought not unreasonable that Parliament should require that officers should be elected, but there is no such requirement. It is perfectly open to a union to appoint officers. The requirement is only that the rules of the union must state whether the officers are to be elected or appointed and how they can be removed from office. The decision


as to what should be done is, as in all these matters, left to the union itself.
The rules must make provision
for the election of a governing body and for its re-election at reasonable intervals".
There are elementary provisions about notification of vacancies, the making of nominations, canvassing and eligibility for voting. These again are matters the details of which are not laid down by the statute, but there is a requirement that the rules of the union must deal with them.
To take the question of eligibility for voting, it might have been argued that, if this was an interventionist statute seeking to stop the unions operating in the way they wished, the least that it should say was that all members of a trade union should be eligible to vote. However, it says only that the rules have to lay down, as the trade union may wish, who should be eligible for voting. These are not fetters. They are a minimum framework.
It is difficult to see how it can be argued that companies should operate within the tightly defined limitations of the Companies Acts but that these very loose requirements should not be applied to the trade union movement. That is an extremely difficult argument to understand at a time when the trade union movement is playing such a great rôle.
It is all very well for Ministers to repeat the arguments put forward in a previous debate about the internal policing of these matters by the TUC. What would Government supporters say if a Conservative Government suggested repealing the Companies Acts and leaving the policing of the affairs of companies to a committee set up by the CBI? The suggestion has only to be mentioned for us to envisage the howls of indignation with which the Labour Party would rightly greet such a proposal. However, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. At a time when the trade unions are being given increased responsibilities, including safety at work under the Employment Protection Act and now the proposals for participation, we do not believe that it is harsh, onerous or unfair to insist upon these requirements remaining on the statute book. They provide a minimum framework which this House ought to retain.

Mr. Robert Hughes: The hon. Member for Cleveland and Whitby (Mr. Brittan) asks why what he regards as not very onerous matters to be laid down in a statute should be objected to by Government supporters, and he goes to refer to the Companies Acts and to make comparisons between how companies should behave and how trade unions should behave. What he misunderstands completely is the long history of democracy in the trade union movement, which far too often is cast aside by the Opposition trying to pretend that trade unions are monolithic organisations dominated by one or two people at the top of them whereas those of us who have experience of the trade union movement know that there is a very long history and a long involvement of ordinary members in the trade unions.
I should at the outset declare my interest. I am a Member who is sponsored by the AUEW, and I am very proud to be so. Although it is necessary for me to declare this interest and although it is not a direct financial interest, since any money involved goes to my constituency party, I claim that I am not changed in my views because I am sponsored, because I was a member of the AUEW and because I was active in that union before coming to this House. My views are formulated by the conviction of the necessity for trade unions and not by any monetary gain, however far removed it may be in my case.
The AUEW was first organised as a trade union in 1826. I do not intend to take the House through its history since them. However, hon. Members must understand that trade union rule books are extremely well drawn and are laid out in detail. In my union there is a clear procedure, which is simple for anyone to follow, about how to attempt to change the rules and how to proceed in the event of there being any challenge by a union member against the executive or against any rule of the union and his feeling that he has been badly treated. Every second year ke have a rules revision conference, though it can meet from time to time in between. The members of that body making the rules are elected directly in their own right according to the electoral constituencies in which they stand.
There is a great deal of misunderstanding about the way that voting in my union


takes place. I shall refer later to postal ballots. Some people, however, in raising the challenge about branch balloting, have suggested—among them some of the pundits in the Press who are always saying how unions should be run—that officers and those who hold other posts in my union are elected by a show of hands at branch meetings. That is not so. There is a proper ballot in which members have to sign a register to show that they have received voting papers. They mark their papers, those papers are put into a ballot box, and they are counted at the end of the meeting. Every member has to be told when voting is to take place.
Candidates are entitled to have printed in a booklet supplied by the union their views on union affairs and, if they wish, on political matters. Members have an ample opportunity to see what candidates stand for and to take part in the voting. I agree that the level of voting is not as high as I should like to see, but that does not destroy the fairness of the procedure for changing the rules, and it is laid down clearly in the union's rule book.

Sir Edward Brown: Although the hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) is giving all honesty to the practice of the union branch to which he himself belongs or belonged, will he not admit that there are branches in the same organisation which have cheated and which have appeared before the courts only in recent months?

Mr. Hughes: It was my intention to come to that in a moment.
We have this procedure where the rules revision committee changes or is entitled to change the rules. Then we have a procedure whereby an individual member who feels aggrieved has a right of appeal, first to the executive, and then, if he is dissatisfied with the executive's ruling, he is entitled to take his case to the final appeal court. That court is composed of union members who are also elected, and it is a very great honour for someone to be elected to the final appeal court. People who are elected to it take their duties very seriously.
Anyone going through the various sittings of the final appeal court will discover that, more often than not, the court rules in favour of the member. This is

a tremendous protection which we have in the union against arbitrary behaviour by an official, by a branch or by some committee of the union.
But no rule book is perfect. We have seen how, with the best will in the world and with the most detailed rule book, the rules can be misinterpreted even by the executive, which naturally has the duty laid upon it to interpret them. We have seen the way in which the executive's interpretation of the rules has been challenged in the courts and changed. That is not to say, however, that the rules have not been honestly drawn or that they have been dishonestly interpreted.
I come, then, to the question of branch balloting as opposed to postal balloting. It is argued that, despite what in my opinion is a first-class practice, some branches can break the rules and, indeed, that some branch officials have been taken to court for breaking them and have been found guilty. That is right, and it is right that any member of the public should have the opportunity to use the common law for his protection if he feels it necessary. I do not quarrel with that.
6.30 p.m.
It is when we come to postal balloting that we begin to see why trade unions fear the intervention of the 1974 Act which lays down minimum requirements and broad general guidelines. The Act does not say that an official must be elected in a particular way, but it lays down a broad framework. The question of postal ballots arose in a most controversial manner. If that had not been so, no one would have been concerned about it.
There was concern about the way in which the AUEW executive interpreted its functions in postal ballots and about the position of the president with respect to his casting vote. What transpired had nothing to do with whether postal ballots were good or bad. It was concerned with whether there ought to be a requirement that trade unions must elect officials by postal voting.
When that issue was discussed in a more sober atmosphere, the suggestion was changed and people said that it would be a good idea for the Government to make money available so as to encourage the trade union movement to use the system of postal voting. The


most important thing in the trade union movement is not only that the ordinary rank-and-file members should take part in trade union organisation at factory level—in the election of shop stewards—but that they should also be encouraged in every way to attend branch meetings and participate in day-to-day discussion of trade union and industrial affairs. In short, they should play their part in branch life. No one would pretend that activity in branch life is perfect.

Mr. Sydney Bidwell: Would my hon. Friend not agree—I speak as a former trade union educationist—that the consequence of an increase in branch activity would be that the portion of the trade union membership which votes Conservative would cease to do so because it would better understand the history of the Labour and trade union movement?

Mr. Hughes: I shall not be tempted to follow my hon. Friend's argument, although I agree that the more education that is given, he it political, social or simply education, the more people will understand what the trade union movement and the Labour Party are about.
How do we get people to give up their spare time in the evening, after a hard day at work—possibly working overtime—to take part in trade union branch life? How can they be made to realise that the trade union is not the executive or some amorphous body but that the trade union is only as strong or as weak as the members who take part in its activities? While postal balloting might increase the numbers of those who took part in a ballot, it would mean a weakening of trade union branch and factory life. It might be asked why this should necessarily lead me to believe that these sections of the 1974 Act should be repealed.
The history of the trade union movement is the history of a struggle for recognition, not just by employers but by Parliament. The movement was born in struggle. It had to gain recognition as a legitimate body. Memories die hard in the movement. It is all too easy to pander to the public imagination by making irrational and extreme statements about trade union officers, be they shop

stewards, branch officials, district secretaries, executive members or full-time officials. Such statements will always get the headlines.
The trade union movement is rightly afraid because the 1974 Act showed that at some time or another a Government might come along and, rather than merely laying down outlines, would begin to dictate to the trade union movement how best to organise its affairs. There is legitimate controversy in the trade union movement—I have heard this subject discussed at branch meetings and weekend conferences—about whether it is better to have elected officers or appointed officers. Some argue that the appointed official is freed from the stresses and strains of having to accommodate opinion within his branch or district. If he wants to take a particular line which is not one which the people in his area want, if he believes that his members should return to work or should come out on strike, if he is a full-time official he has more authority in putting forward his view.
I take the contrary view. I take the view that an elected official, if he is a good, honest official, will be elected irrespective of the views he puts forward. The trade union movement has a respect for honesty. The movement is desperately afraid that some Government in the future will say that it must elect its officials or appoint its officials and that it must decide such and such by a certain method of election. The movement is afraid that a Government will decree that no official can be properly elected unless he receives a certain percentage of the ballot. We have seen all of these issues developed in the Press.
If the trade union movement is to grow in strength and play in our affairs the part which I believe we all want it to play, the best thing to do is, as far as possible, to remove any framework of law. I accept that it can never be entirely withdrawn. As I understand it, this suggested amendment would not remove from a trade union the legal responsibility to produce accounts and so on.
It is extraordinary that it should be thought necessary to specify in legislation the benefits which should be paid to trade union members. Any trade union rule book will tell a member exactly what benefits are paid, right down to the


death benefit. Every trade union lays down how much money shall be collected and how it will be donated to a political fund. Every trade union has its superannuation funds organised in such a way that, so far as is possible, there is no question of malpractice. There is no law anywhere governing any sphere of trade union activity, company law, local authority work or even parliamentary work, which can guarantee that there will never be any malpractice. No one is arguing that the law should be entirely removed from trade union affairs.
We say that the best way in which the trade union movement can flourish and play a constructive rôle in society is by allowing members of the movement to play a part in the affairs of the trade unions and to govern their own affairs. The trade union movement is perfectly capable of looking after itself and of taking care of any official, elected or otherwise, who does not abide by the rules.

Mr. Walter Clegg: The hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) has made an interesting contribution to the debate. He obviously speaks from great personal and practical experience. He stressed the gravamen of his party's argument, which is that the trade unions are democratic institutions and, therefore, another democratic institution like the House of Commons should think hard before interfering with them. This argument has some merit. I cannot go all the way with the hon. Member, however, because while the structure of the unions, as defined by their rule books, may be democratic we are not entirely convinced by experience that they are democratic in practice.
We should consider the interaction between the law and the unions in this light because the power of the unions is great. There are people who think that it is too great. Great power must always be accompanied by great responsibility. Parliament cannot stand on one side and leave great organs of power to regulate themselves. There must be controls by Parliament on the trade unions just as much as on companies and professions. My own profession—that of a lawyer—is much regulated by Acts of Parliament.

Mr. Bidwell: The lawyers have a closed shop.

Mr. Robert Hughes: Despite the regulation which the hon. Gentleman mentions, recent evidence suggests that lawyers are not very good at policing themselves.

Mr. Clegg: Unlike the bodies referred to in the last debate, at least we have an outside person on our complaints tribunals—a provision which was made in the last Solicitors Act and which I supported.
We are asking for very little. We are merely setting out guidelines. It would not be a bad thing if the Government accepted the amendment. It would show that they are not entirely against the law having some control over the way in which unions are run. The kernel of the argument must be that, where power exists within the State, the duty of the House is to see that that power is used beneficently. Alas, the powers of the trade unions are not always so used, despite the rule book. There are rotten apples in every barrel. The manipulation of the rule book causes concern to Parliament.
It would be better if Labour Members accepted more readily that Parliament has a real interest in the matter. Today, however, there have been arguments about the differences between the police complaints tribunal and the trade union complaints tribunal. The Government argued that there was public interest in the police when there were complaints. Equally there is public interest in the trade union movement. It has been given great powers by recent Acts, and people want to see those powers exercised well for the benefit of both the movement and the country. For these reasons, I urge the House to accept the amendment.

6.45 p.m.

Sir Raymond Gower: I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for North Fylde (Mr. Clegg). Nearly all the views expressed by the hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) were wholly admirable. I join in the praise of the hon. Gentleman. He has obviously been a sincere, sound, good trade unionist for most of his life, and we commend him for that. In his speech, however, he enunciated a remarkable proposition. He said that because the trade union movement is basically democratic, because his experience of it has been generally good and because most trade unions are run on sound lines, there is no reason why


there should be any minimum requirement—which is all that we are seeking—within our law.
On that argument we might say that we did not need to legislate for many aspects of our national life. We could say that most limited bodies are run well and that there is no reason to introduce any legal requirements for their activities. British trade and industry have been highly regarded. It was once said that British quality was the best in the world and that the Englishman's word was his bond and, therefore, no legal requirement was necessary. [An. HON. MEMBER: "What about the word of a Scotsman?"] It might have been said of a Scotsman too.

Mr. Robert Hughes: My limited understanding of the law is that verbal contracts are not binding in England whereas they are in Scotland.

Sir Raymond Gower: The point I was making was that in many spheres of our national life the best practitioners, the best companies and the best people in any activity, trade or profession have set certain fine standards. But Governments of all parties have deemed it correct to legislate, not necessarily to the standard of the best. Indeed, in many cases the best companies, firms and individuals will do better than the law requires. All we are asking for is a simple minimum requirement.
The hon. Gentleman's argument, if pursued ad absurdum, is that we do not need legislation for local authorities because they are free, democratic institutions. On that basis we would never need Bills dealing with local government. The hon. Gentleman's argument would be that because local authorities do so well on a democratic basis Parliament does not need to interfere. Britain has been a fine democratic country but we have required the sanctions of the law despite our democratic instincts. I hope that Ministers will think along these lines. There is no reasonable cause for assuming that there is one part of our public or economic life—the trade union movement—which can be exempted from this requirement, but that is what is being said.
The Minister implied in the earlier debate that the right of combination

should be made sacrosanct. He went further, because he really said that the possible abuse of the right of combination should be regarded as sacrosanct. We do not want that, but we want the right of combination.
In this country memories are often too long. We are no longer necessarily the best in the world in any of these spheres. Other countries have been more ready to forget. There have been much worse hardships in competing countries on the Continent, such as greater unemployment and economic problems. They are now prepared to look to the future without these nasty reflections. As a nation it behoves us to forget the struggles of 100 years or more ago and to embark together on seeking greater achievements for the future than those of which we have been capable recently. It would be foolish to assume that our recent performance, whether due to defects of management, trade unions, the Government or anybody else, has been satisfactory. Our performance as a nation has so many imperfections that we should look at the moats in our own eyes whatever part of the community we may be in.
I hope that the Minister and those who, quite naturally, are proud of the good things in the trade union movement and in the industrial life in which they participate will be prepared to think it reasonable that Parliament should accept these minimum requirements, because the law, which has sometimes been described by Labour Members as undesirable, is ultimately the only fair and impartial custodian of freedom. That is as true for trade unionists as it is for any other person in the community.

Mr. W. R. Rees-Davies: I wish to make some brief observations. I should like the Minister to tell us whether any of our neighbours in Europe, especially France, Belgium, Germany and Holland, have arranged their affairs concerning major trade unions without any type of control or the insertion of any code of law for the control of trade unions. We have heard nothing of the situation which obtains among our friends in the EEC or in the United States of America on matters of this kind.
Section 6 of the 1974 Act did nothing more than seek to introduce and codify


reasonable rules of natural justice and to invite the inclusion of certain provisions in trade union rules. Under subsection (9) trade unions had to comply with seven provisions including the notification of vacancies, nominations, the canvassing of election addresses, the eligibility for voting and the procedure. Those matters were merely designed to introduce rules to conform with natural justice. It is, of course, required that someone should oversee those matters.
Section 8 of the 1974 Act laid down that the Registrar of Friendly Societies had certain powers to ensure that the provisions were carried out satisfactorily. The legislation now before us will remove those requirements and enable trade unions to be completely above the law. It is this aspect which worries so many British people. I should like to know whether there is a precedent for such action from the United States of America or a major country in Europe. Or are we going out on a limb and becoming the only country which has no effective control and puts the unions above the law?
I have listened carefully to this and other debates on this subject. As a major European Power, we have not looked at the position which obtains in other countries.

Mr. Bidwell: I believe that the hon. and learned Gentleman will discover that we have a quite close affinity with the Scandinavian countries in our approach to this matter.

Mr. Rees-Davies: I should not have thought so, but no doubt we shall hear if that is the case.
What we are particularly concerned about is the position of our partners in the EEC. The United States of America would provide a valuable precedent. However, before this matter is concluded perhaps we may hear something about this aspect, whether we are going out on a limb on our own and, if so, why we have elected to do so.

Mr. Bidwell: In 1971 the Conservative Government introduced massive industrial legislation. We leapt from what was held to be the least regulated trade union law or form of law, in which there was little legal interference in industrial affairs, to the most massively oppressive system

of all time. A great deal was borrowed from the United States. Surely the hon. and learned Gentleman understands that. Indeed, as a consequence there was such a reaction that the Conservative Government were defeated and a Labour Government were elected. That was what it was all about.

Mr. Rees-Davies: That is merely saying that if we went too far we must now take the opportunity not only of reversing what has passed but of going further than we need to go. I think that there should be a correlation, if at all possible, of reasonable control, as a matter of law, of the trade union movement and reasonable assurances that the trade unions will comply with the rules of justice which are enforceable by law not only in this country but in major European nations. We have not heard about this aspect, and it is by way of an addendum to the wholly admirable speeches of my right hon. and hon. Friends that I raise this matter.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Albert Booth): The effect of the amendment is to require a large number of specified matters to be included in the rule books of trade unions and employers' associations and to invoke sanctions for failure to comply with the requirements.
The hon. Member for Cleveland and Whitby (Mr. Brittan) cited part of the section of the Donovan Report which deals with trade union rules to show that we have had within the law of our land for a long time a number of special requirements concerning the content of union rule books. He might have advantaged the House if he had gone on to quote the Donovan Report's comments in the following paragraph. It says:
We think that the requirements can and should be revised with a view to ensuring better safeguards for individual members, but, without imparing the freedom which trade unions ought to enjoy to frame rules to meet their own circumstances.
It is more in the spirit of those comments that the Government take their stand on this issue than on the basis that we should continue the practice of including in the rule books special provisions for trade unions.
It is no part of our argument that the statutes of the land should not have specific and detailed provisions as to the


administration of trade unions. I shall go on to show that in fact we are maintaining the view that there should be specific and detailed provisions in the law as to the administration of trade unions. Therefore, I do not think it behoves me to show that there are any other countries in the EEC which have no requirements within their law as to the administration of trade unions. We think that the form of legal control which is suggested in the amendment is unnecessary and to some degree harmful.

Mr. Rees-Davies: I think the Minister will agree that there are specific provisions in each of the EEC countries and the United States of America which have the sanction of law and which are enforceable through the courts. Those provisions ensure that proper rules are laid down in respect of trade unions.

Mr. Booth: Yes; I am not challenging what the hon. and learned Gentleman is saying. I shall demonstrate that there are specific and detailed requirements in our law relating to the administration of trade unions and that it is the view of this Government that there should be such requirements.
7.0 p.m.
Schedule 2 to the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974 contains eight pages of detailed and specific provisions on the way that trade unions should be administered. They lay down not broad headings but precise and detailed requirements as to the annual returns which unions must make, the qualifications for appointment of auditors, their removal, functions, and so on. Any union which fails to meet these precise and detailed requirements is subject to the sanction provided in Section 12 of the Act.
It is no part of our case that there should not be a detailed and precise requirement that unions should be above the law. We have never challenged the argument that unions have special responsibilities and should therefore be subject to special provisions in law. What we challenge is that there would be any advantage in adding to those detailed and precise provisions a number of broad headings and saying "You must make rules which correspond with these headings. If not, you will be subject to

a special sanction." That is the proposition on which the amendment is based.
The TUC, as has been acknowledged, attaches considerable importance to the quality of union rule books. It regards the need to have clearly defined rules as an essential feature of a trade union's internal government. That was why the TUC responded to the Donovan recommendations about trade union rules. I do not accept the framework in which this was referred to by the hon. Member for Cleveland and Whitby, who stated it in such a way as to imply that all union rule books were seriously deficient and that since the Donovan Report was issued a lot had been done to put them right. I I hope he did not mean that.
The principles enunciated by the TUC as guidance for unions in framing or revising their rules at rules conferences were embodied in the rule books of most—not all—unions before the Donovan recommendations. It is interesting that no hon. Member has given an example of a current deficiency in a union rule book under any of the headings mentioned in the section covered by the amendment.
The TUC did not state that unions must make rules to correspond with a number of headings. It issued advice on the basic principles which should be embodied in rule books concerning admission, discipline, expulsion and the election of people to office. Those are important principles. The authority of the TUC made it possible for those principles to be enunciated.
It is noticeable that in Section 6 of the Act—this was readily acknowledged by the hon. Member for Cleveland and Whitby—no principles are enunciated. There are not precise requirements. There is merely a list of headings.
My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) demonstrated clearly that most unions have procedures for revising their rules at frequent intervals. I have had the honour to be a delegate of the Wallsend branch of the Draughtsmen's Association to one of the association's rules conferences. The rules conference was better attended than this debate, and interest in and knowledge of the union's rules was of a very high order. That conference demonstrated to me that the rules of that association were being


changed to meet the specific requirements of the membership. It was not enough that the rules would meet various headings. It was important that the association's rules should reflect the experience and problems of the membership and enable it to work within a framework which reflected that experience.
The amendment may be held by some to restrict the freedom of trade unions to make their own rules. To the extent that it is held to do that, it may run contrary to Article 3 of ILO Convention 87, which makes it clear that unions are required to have the right to draw up their own rules in full freedom. The appropriate paragraph states:
Workers' and employers' organisations shall have the right to draw up their constitution and rules, to elect their representatives in full freedom, to organise their administration and activities and to formulate their programmes. Public authorities shall refrain from any interference which would restrict the right or impede the lawful exercise thereof. The law of the land shall not be such as to impair, nor shall it be applied so as to impair, the guarantees provided by this convention.

Mr. Rees-Davies: The Minister must be careful. I am prepared to bet that neither the ILO nor his advisers have advised him that there is any conflict between that position and the law as it stood. The right hon. Gentleman is going wildly astray. Under the law as it stood in 1974 there was an obligation to provide certain basic principles of natural justice. When the right hon. Gentleman was a glasshouse man, or whatever it was, he was entitled to add many other provisions which his membership wanted to have added. The 1974 Act set out certain provisions with which every union ought reasonably to comply. However, unions could add further provisions of their own. The Act did not inhibit the guarantee of freedom of the rights of unions to put into their own rules whatever they wanted. The right hon. Gentleman must be careful not to mislead the House. I intervene because we are now departing from the commonly accepted practice in other countries.

Mr. Booth: I am being extremely careful not to mislead the House. I am not going against any advice which I have received from legal authorities in my Department. If the effect of carrying the amendment is not in any way to

impede, restrict, limit or circumscribe the freedom of unions to make their own rules in their own way without interference from the law, I suggest that it is of no great consequence.
We have taken it upon ourselves as a Parliament to make detailed provisions—the detailed provisions in Schedule 2—which require union funds to be administered in a particular way. If under these headings we were to write in specific directions, we should be in danger of cutting right across the basis of the ILO Convention to which I have referred.
I want now to deal with the effect of the common law on what we are doing if we delete Section 6. I hold that it is completely fallacious to suggest that we are wiping out a common law right by taking out Section 6. That section, in so far as it refers to rules of natural justice, is completely superfluous. No union member is disadvantaged by the removal of this section in bringing a case based upon a contention that his union, in its framing or application of rules, has not worked in conjunction with the principle of natural justice.
The reference to natural justice is utterly superfluous and unnecessary for that purpose. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North said, unions have never sought to restrict the rights of their members to use the common law if those members believed that their union's action would cut across the principle of natural justice.

Sir D. Walker-Smith: Surely the point is that the right of natural justice would give a worker who was excluded or expelled from a union a right to a hearing but that the hearing would be as to whether the union had proceeded in accordance with its rules. If the rules are arbitrary, the fact that a member has a right of hearing by natural justice is of no advantage to him. That was the thinking behind Lord Salmon's speech in the other place.

Mr. Booth: As I understand the position, the requirements of natural justice under common law are not as limited as the right hon. and learned Gentleman suggests. If a union neglected the requirements of natural justice in the framing of its rules, a member of that union would


have recourse to common law to challenge the union. Therefore, the amendment would not in practice confer on union members any rights that they did not already possess in respect of the application of natural justice under the common law.
Up to now the debate has not dealt with the sanction introduced by the amendment. That is a pity, because the sanction is unique. Although there is not much new that one can say in this debate, it is a pity that something new which can be said has been totally neglected by the advocates of the amendment.
The effect of the sanction has been changed since we last debated this matter by the passing of the Employment Protection Act. The sanction is based on the proposition that, if a union or employers' association does not comply with Section 6, the Registrar is required to strike it from the list. The main effect of being struck from the list before the passing of the Employment Protection Act was to remove the tax advantages of a union's benevolent funds. I always thought that that was incongruous because Section 12 provides for fines for not meeting other requirements of the Act, but this was a particular and peculiar one introduced in Section 8(6) in respect of a failure to comply with Section 6.
With the passing of the Employment Protection Act, however, the amendment would mean that a union could not be certified as independent, so that in certain slightly different circumstances it would be denied a number of the rights which flow from such certification under the Employment Protection Act. Also, a union struck from the list in those circumstances could not have recourse to the recognition provisions of the Employment Protection Act, which could be crucial for some unions. Union members in those circumstances would not have the rights to time off or to perform their duties as provided for in the Employment Protection Act.

Mr. Brittan: Will the Minister say which of the provisions in Section 6 he thinks it is reasonable that a union should not comply with while at the same time enjoying the rights under the Employment Protection Act?

Mr. Booth: I am not prepared to do that. As I have said, all these headings are perfectly valid as headings. I do not object to them as heading for rules. Most unions choose rules which would fit these headings. Outwith the particular and specific requirements of Schedule 2, however, unions should be free to determine the requirements of their rule books. I therefore hold that this penalty, if applied to matters which are only matters of heading, would be particularly inapt, would be unduly severe and would introduce a totally unnecessary legal control. I therefore ask the House to reject the amendment.

7.15 p.m.

Mr. Ian Percival: Once again, the Minister has taken a series of ill-assorted points which neither separately nor together make any sort of case for what he is asking the House to do. He says that he does not quarrel with the principle of detailed regulation and refers to Schedule 2, which contains regulations far more detailed than anything in Section 6 of the Act. The argument for that is: if it is right to have regulations as detailed as there are in that schedule, what can be wrong with this measure of regulation?
The Minister might also have said that everything in Schedule 2 came straight out of Schedule 5 of the Industrial Relations Act 1971. So much for his oft-repeated legend that this Bill is to get rid of everything in that Act! In fact, Schedule 1, too, though badly tinkered with, preserves other provisions useful in that Act. It is hypocritical to speak in that way, as well as being such a very bad argument.
Then the Minister argued that it was contrary to the ILO convention. Is he suggesting at this late stage that that is something to which the House should have regard? Everything in Section 6 was recommended by Donovan. Is he saying that the Donovan Commission had thought of that? Is he saying that he has been advised in terms that there is a danger that this provision is contrary to the ILO convention? I ask him to have another look at that.
I would also ask him to have another look at what he said about common law rights. I am sure that the Minister will find it interesting to have another look at


the intervention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith). Previous experience of the Minister in Committee convinces me that it is not his habit to want to take a bad point. If he takes further advice on those two points, I think that he will find that they are bad. I hope that his right hon. and hon. Friends in another place will not be tempted to rely upon them.
The hon. Gentleman's last point was that there was conjoined with Section 6 a right to strike someone off for noncompliance. Of course there is. What is the good of such provisions without penalty? He then told us some of the awful things that would happen to someone who did not comply. But what he did not say was that it would be easy for everyone to comply with them, that anyone who was prepared to fulfil his minimum obligations, and what I think the Minister would regard as minimum obligations in this respect, need not fear any of the perils to which he referred. So that, too, is a bad argument.
The hon. Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) made a speech that was more in point on this occasion. Many of us could have agreed with almost everything he said. But it is a pity that he was not in Committee with some of us on this Bill. If he had been, he would have realised that in his speech tonight he was fighting many battles that were fought long ago and the need for which exists no longer.
Many of us subscribe to many of the views that he expressed. Most of us want to see the maximum freedom for people to combine to regulate their own affairs. That is why Section 6 is framed in the widest possible terms—so as to leave the greatest degree of trust to the individuals who are either elected or appointed, or whatever it is, to give effect to these provisions. I shall not elaborate on that because my hon. Friend the Member for Cleveland and Whitby (Mr.

Brittan) did so very clearly in presenting this suggestion to the House.

I should like to take up another phrase used by the hon. Member for Aberdeen, North. He talked about removing the framework of the law. Those were his words, but I do not think that he meant to get rid of the framework of the law altogether. I think that he probably meant that it should be removed to the background so that it played a less prominent part in industrial relations affairs.

Most of us on the Opposition Benches would agree with that. We regard the law as something at the end of the road, something there to be prayed in aid only if and when everything else has failed. But it has to be there. We must recognise that there are occasions when, sometimes with the best will in the world, people cannot agree about something important to them, and in a civilised society the purpose of the law is to be there at the end of the road so that, if and when all else fails, the parties have a tribunal, the court, to which they can go and a law which the court can interpret and implement in order to resolve the difficulty.

Section 6 is exactly in that category. It could not trouble anyone who gives any responsible consideration to the rules of his union. It is there only as the end of the road, so that on the occasion when someone is not willing to fulfil even those minimum responsibilities, there is something that can be done about it.

It is for that purpose and in that spirit that this amendment was put forward in the first place and carried into the Act. We regard it as a very pig-headed step by the Minister and not in any way supported by his argument that he should now be trying to take these useful provisions out of the Act. I ask my right hon. and hon. Friends to vote for the suggested amendment.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 250, Noes 281.

Division No. 38.]
AYES
[7.23 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Banks, Robert
Body, Richard


Aitken, Jonathan
Bell, Ronald
Boscawen, Hon Robert


Alison, Michael
Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Bottomley, Peter


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Berry, Hon Anthony
Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)


Arnold, Tom
Biffen, John
Boyson, Or Rhodes (Brent)


Atkins, Rt Hon H. (Spelthorne)
Biggs-Davison, John
Brittan, Leon


Baker, Kenneth
Blaker, Peter
Brocklebank-Fowler, C.




Brotherton, Michael
Holland, Philip
Osborn, John


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Hooson, Emlyn
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)


Bryan, Sir Paul
Hordern, Peter
Paisley, Rev Ian


Buchanan-Smith, Alick
Howell, David (Guildford)
Pattie, Geoffrey


Budgen, Nick
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Penhaligon, David


Bulmer, Esmond
Hurd, Douglas
Percival Ian


Burden, F. A.
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Carlisle Mark
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Pink, R. Bonner


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Powell, Rt Hon J. Enoch


Churchill, W. S.
James, David
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Prior, Rt Hon James


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Rathbone, Tim


Clegg, Walter
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Cockcroft, John
Jopling, Michael
Rees, Peter (Dover &amp; Deal)


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Cope, John
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Cormack, Patrick
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)


Corrie, John
Kershaw, Anthony
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Costain A P.
Kilfedder, James
Ridley, Hon Nicholas


Crouch David
Kimball, Marcus
Ridsdale, Julian


Crowder F. P.
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)
Rifkind, Malcolm


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Dean, Paul (N Somerset)
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Knight, Mrs Jill
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Knox, David
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Drayson, Burnaby
Lamont, Norman
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


du Cann, Rt Hon Edward
Lane, David
Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


Dunlop, John
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Royle, Sir Anthony


Durant, Tony
Latham, Michael (Melton)
Sainsbury, Tim


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Lawrence, Ivan
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Lawson, Nigel
Shelton, William (Streatham)



Le Marchant, Spencer
Shepherd, Colin


Elliott, Sir William
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Shersby, Michael


Emery, Peter
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Silvester, Fred


Eyre, Reginald
Lloyd, Ian
Sims, Roger


Fairbairn, Nicholas
Loveridge, John
Sinclair, Sir George


Fairgrieve, Russell
Luce, Richard
Skeet, T. H. H.


Fell, Anthony
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Finsberg, Geoffrey
McCrindle, Robert
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Fisher, Sir Nigel
McCusker, H.
Speed, Keith


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
Macfarlane, Neil
Spence, John


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
MacGregor, John
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)


Fookes, Miss Janet
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Farnham)
Sproat, Iain


Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)
Stainton, Keith


Fox, Marcus
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)
Stanbrook, Ivor


Freud, Clement
Madel, David
Stanley, John


Fry, Peter
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Galbraith, Hon T. G. D.
Marten, Neil
Stokes, John


Gardiner, George (Reigate)
Mather, Carol
Stradling Thomas, J.


Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)
Maude, Angus
Tapsell, Peter


Gilmour, Rt Hon Ian (Chesham)
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
Mawby, Ray
Tebbit, Norman


Glyn, Dr Alan
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Temple-Morris, Peter


Godber, Rt Hon Joseph
Mayhew, Patrick
Thomas, Rt Hon P. (Hendon S)


Goodhart, Philip
Meyer, Sir Anthony
Townsend, Cyril D.


Goodhew, Victor
Mills, Peter
Trotter, Neville


Goodlad, Alastair
Miscampbell, Norman
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Gorst, John
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Vaughan, Dr Gerard


Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Moate, Roger
Viggers, Peter


Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Molyneaux, James
Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)


Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
Monro, Hector
Wakeham, John


Gray, Hamish
Montgomery, Fergus
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Griffiths, Eldon
Moore, John (Croydon C)
Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)


Grist, Ian
More, Jasper (Ludlow)
Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek


Grylls, Michael
Morgan, Geraint
Wall, Patrick


Hall, Sir John
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)
Walters, Dennis


Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)
Weatherill, Bernard


Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)
Wiggin, Jerry


Hampson, Dr Keith
Mudd, David
Winterton, Nicholas


Hannam, John
Neave, Airey
Wood, Rt Hon Richard


Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Nelson, Anthony
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)


Hastings, Stephen
Neubert, Michael
Younger, Hon George


Havers, Sir Michael
Newton, Tony



Hawkins, Paul
Normanton, Tom
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Hayhoe, Barney
Nott, John
Mr. Cecil Parkinson and


Hicks, Robert
Onslow, Cranley
Mr. W. Benyon.


Higgins, Terence L.
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally





NOES


Allaun, Frank
Ashley, Jack
Bagier, Gordon A. T.


Anderson, Donald
Ashton, Joe
Bain, Mrs Margaret


Archer, Peter
Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)


Armstrong, Ernest
Atkinson, Norman
Bates, Alf







Bean, R. E.
Golding, John
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Gould, Bryan
Moyle, Roland


Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Gourlay, Harry
Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick


Bidwell, Sydney
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King


Bishop, E. S.
Grant, John (Islington C)
Newens, Stanley


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Grocott, Bruce
Noble, Mike


Boardman, H.
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Oakes, Gordon


Booth, Albert
Harper, Joseph
Ogden, Eric


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
O'Halloran, Michael


Boyden, James (Bish Auck)
Hart, Rt Hon Judith
O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian


Bradley, Tom
Hatton, Frank
Orbach, Maurice


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Hayman, Mrs Helens
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley


Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)
Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Ovenden, John


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Heffer, Eric S.
Padley, Walter


Buchan, Norman
Henderson, Douglas
Palmer, Arthur


Buchanan, Richard
Hooley, Frank
Park, George


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
Horam, John
Parker, John


Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)
Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
Parry, Robert


Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)
Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
Pavitt, Laurie


Campbell, Ian
Huckfield, Les
Pendry, Tom


Canavan, Dennis
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)
Perry, Ernest


Cant, R. B.
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Prescott, John


Carmichael, Neil
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Price, C. (Lewisham W)


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Price, William (Rugby)


Cartwright, John
Hunter, Adam
Radice, Giles


Clemitson, Ivor
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Reid, George


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Coleman, Donald
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)
Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Concannon, J. D.
Janner, Greville
Roderick, Caerwyn


Conlan, Bernard
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Rodgers, George (Chorley)


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Rodgers, William (Stockton)


Corbett, Robin
Jenkins, Rt Hon Roy (Stechford)
Rooker, J. W.


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
John, Brynmor
Rose, Paul B.


Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)
Johnson, James (Hull West)
Rowlands, Ted


Crawford, Douglas
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)
Sandelson, Neville


Cronin, John
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Sedgemore, Brian


Crosland, Rt Hon Anthony
Jones, Barry (East Flint)
Selby, Harry


Cryer, Bob
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)


Cunningham, G. (Islington S)
Judd, Frank
Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)


Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiteh)
Kaufman, Gerald
Shore Rt Hon Peter


Dalyell, Tam
Kelley, Richard
Short, Rt Hon E. (Newcastle C)


Davidson, Arthur
Kerr, Russell
Short, Mrs Renée (Wolv NE)


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)


Davies, Denzil (Llaneill[...])
Kinnock, Neil
Sillars, James


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Lambie, David
Silverman, Julius


Deakins Eric
Lamborn, Harry
Skinner, Dennis


Dean, Joseph (Leeds W)
Lamond, James
Small, William


Delargy, Hugh
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)
Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Leadbitter, Ted
Snape, Peter


Dempsey, James
Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton &amp; Slough)
Spearing, Nigel


Doig, Peter
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Spriggs, Leslie


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Litterick, Tom
Stallard, A. W.


Duffy, A. E. P.
Loyden, Eddie




Luard, Evan
Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)


Dunn, James A.
Lyon, Alexander (York)
Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)


Dunnett, Jack
Lyons Edward (Bradford W)
Stoddart, David


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
McCartney, Hugh
Stonehouse, Rt Hon John


Eadie, Alex
MacCormick, Iain
Stott, Roger


Edge, Geoff
McElhone, Frank
Strang, Gavin


Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
MacFarquhar, Roderick
Strauss, Rt Hon Dr Shirley


Ellis John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
McGuire, Michael (Ince)
Summerskill Hon Dr Shirley


Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
Mackenzie, Gregor
Swain, Thomas


English, Michael
Mackintosh, John P.
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)


Ennals, David
Maclennan, Robert
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)


Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)
Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)


Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
McNamara, Kevin
Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)


Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
Madden, Max
Thompson, George


Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Mahon, Simon
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)


Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
Mallalieu, J. P. W.
Tierney, Sydney


Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
Marks, Kenneth
Tinn, James


Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
Marquand, David
Tomlinson, John


Flannery, Martin
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)
Tomney, Frank


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)
Torney, Tom


Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Maynard, Miss Joan
Tuck, Raphael


Ford, Ben
Meacher, Michael
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.


Forrester, John
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)


Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Mikardo, Ian
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)


Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)
Millan, Bruce
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)


Freeson, Reginald
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)


Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)
Ward, Michael


Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Mitchell, R. C. (Soton, Itchen)
Watkins, David


George, Bruce
Molloy, William
Weetch, Ken


Gilbert, Dr John
Moonman, Eric
Wellbeloved, James


Ginsburg, David
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Welsh, Andrew







White, Frank R. (Bury)
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Wrigglesworth, Ian


White, James (Pollok)
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)
Young, David (Bolton E)


Whitlock, William
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)



Willey, Rt Hon Frederick
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)



Williams, Alan (Swansea W)
Wise, Mrs Audrey
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)
Woodall, Alec
Mr. J. D. Dormand and


Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Woof, Robert
Mr. James Hamilton.

Question accordingly negatived.

Mr. Hayhoe: I beg to move,
That, pursuant to the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the House suggests to the Lords the following Amendment to the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill:
Clause 1, page 1, line 19, leave out paragraph (e).
The issue of the closed shop has been central to many of the debates that we have had on the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act and on the amending Bill in the previous and present Sessions. It is a highly emotive subject.
Some trade unionists see the closed shop as a lever to increase their industrial power and to make their negotiating strength greater. There are also trade unionists who see it as a weapon which may be used against the free rider, the strike breaker or the scab. To other trade unionists the closed shop is a highly important matter. Equally, it is seen by unwilling trade union members, those who have been compelled against their wishes to become members of a trade union, and by many people outside the trade union movement—and perhaps some of them do not have too great a knowledge of the movement—as at best an unattractive and as at worst an unacceptable aspect of trade unionism.
The emotions for and against the closed shop are easily aroused. I think that generally such emotions are harmful in the context of industrial relations. In retrospect there seems little doubt that the action that my party took when in Government in 1971 in seeking to outlaw the closed shop was not as effective as some of its supporters had hoped in helping individual freedom and the libertarian principle. It aroused undue and very strong feelings among some trade unions. It was certainly misrepresented as being a total attack upon the closed shop, though I do not think that it was.
In the interests of trying to find a way out of the difficulties that I have described we have taken the view that perhaps we struck the wrong balance in the 1971 Act. We have sought in successive debates to

try to find some reasonable and acceptable compromise which can be broadly agreed. Such a compromise may not be completely acceptable to the strong trade unionist or to the person who puts individual liberty above all else. However, we have sought some reasonable working compromise to remove the closed shop issue from the centre of political controversy. What we have attempted in that direction has been well worth while.
I am extremely sorry that the Government have not been prepared to move from the position that they adopted when in Opposition at the peak of the emotive reaction against the 1971 Act. The decisions then taken between the Labour Party Executive and the leaders of the TUC seem to have run right through our debates about the closed shop. The Government have stuck rigidly to that original, extreme position. In effect they are saying that the individual may be compelled under threat of dismissal and without compensation to join and to remain a member of a trade union unless he has objections to membership of any and every trade union on the ground of religious belief.
This is an incredibly narrow chink of hope for the conscientious objector, and only a rare brand of person would meet that qualification on the ground of religious belief in regard to trade union membership in general. It is not the kind of conscientious objection that was suggested by the Donovan Commission. The Royal Commission's Report said that reasonable safeguards should be associated with the closed shop and provided by law, and they should include conscientious objection. A deeply-held personal conviction may be good enough for a Labour Member of Parliament to defy a three-line Whip and thus place in jeopardy the existence of the Labour Government. It was good enough also for the noble lord, Lord Houghton, a former senior Labour Minister and a past chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, who thought such a test reasonable.


However, the test of a deeply-held personal conviction is not good enough for the Secretary of State for Employment. He wants a narrower concept.
The present discussion relates to those who have reasonable grounds for objection to compulsory membership of a particular union specified in a union membership agreement. Again, in this proposal we are in line with the Donovan Report. On the topic of the closed shop being brought into the work place where it has not existed before, paragraph 563 of the Donovan Report mentions the difficulties that can arise when existing employees who have worked in that firm for many years and who are not members of unions are suddenly confronted with this attempt to compel them to become members. The Report emphasises that a more difficult case arises when an employer dismisses an existing employee who refuses to join a trade union following the introduction of a closed shop.
Our view—again it follows Donovan—is that the employee
should be able to succeed against the employer so long as he can show that he has reasonable grounds for refusing to join the union.
That is precisely what our amendment says of an individual who is not a member of a union. Let us take as an example a man who has worked on the railways for many years and who may have good reasons for his not being a union member. He can now be confronted with the fact that he either has to join a union or will be dismissed—dismissed without compensation and, presumably, with loss of pension entitlement and many other aspects associated with dismissal. Such a person may be close to the end of his working life.
Therefore, the Government are imposing a brutal penalty on individuals who find themselves in such circumstances. However, if the Government accept our proposed wording—in other words, if the Act is left as this House passed it in 1974—and if an individual can convince an industrial tribunal that he was acting on reasonable grounds, he would at least be entitled to compensation. The only issue with which we are concerned in a strictly legalistic sense in the suggested amendment relates to what constitutes fair and unfair dismissal in the context of the

closed shop and the possibility of obtaining compensation.
I believe that the Government should think again about the situation. These provisions have now existed for 18 months and I do not think they have caused great difficulty. If the Government believe they have failed they must put the facts before us, but I repeat that no great difficulties have been caused by the present wording of the Act. Indeed, the wording may be helpful in protecting the individuals who have become known as the Ferrybridge Six. I do not wish to enter into the merits of that case because it is a matter to be considered by an industrial tribunal from which a decision is expected, according to this morning's Press, some time next week. It is a pity that the tribunal's decision was not known before today's debate. I am sorry that the tribunal was not able to proceed at a faster pace. It would have been valuable to know the results.
7.45 p.m.
Equally, if there is a long delay in determining whether individuals are entitled to national insurance benefits for the six-week period, surely the determination by an insurance officer should be made swiftly. Therefore I hope that there will be no undue delay. It is a little unfortunate that we are now debating these important matters without knowing the decision of the insurance officer or that reached by the industrial tribunal.
It is satisfactory that the industrial tribunal is to be the body on which the Government place responsibility, but the Government are giving the tribunals enormous responsibility. My right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) referred earlier in the debate to the provisions of the schedule to the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974, but a great raft of other responsibilities is laid upon those tribunals by the Employment Protection Act. There is little doubt that industrial tribunals will make sensible, reasonable and pragmatic judgments because they are able to examine complex situations and to take a reasonable view. I should be happy to leave the question of judgment of reasonable grounds to an industrial tribunal. I believe that they are well equipped to make sensible decisions on the matter.
The Government are letting a golden opportunity slip by. They regard this as a chance of shifting the closed shop issue away from the centre of party controversy. They should try to reach a compromise more broadly acceptable to Labour Back Benchers—of whom there are few present at the moment, but many of those Back Benchers would be prepared to go along with a compromise. There might be some hon. Members below the Government Gangway who would resist such a compromise. That would only endorse our view about the merits of our proposals.
I am sure that there would be relief in the country, and, indeed, within industry, if our proposals were accepted. Even in many trade unions there would be satisfaction if a reasonable compromise could be reached which did not restrict, undermine, or demolish—all the emotive terms which the Secretary of State for Employment is wont to use on these occasions—and involving the concept of the right to combine and the ability to work together with people of one's own choice. It should be possible to find a broadly acceptable way out of this dilemma.
I ask again why the Government do not accept our sensible compromise. Can they not, even now, see the value of proper safeguards? I think they are mad to miss this golden opportunity. It may not recur for some time. Their intransigence in refusing to agree to reasonable safeguards, is keeping the closed shop issue at the centre of political controversy as a damaging growth on the side of industrial relations. Even at this late stage, could they not think again and agree to an extension of the safeguards to the individual, other than the extremely narrow grounds of religious belief to which they have been attached so strongly for so long?

Sir D. Walker-Smith: As with the earlier proposal to delete Section 5 from the 1974 Act we are now discussing a proposal that removes vital and valuable protection from the individual worker against the loss of his livelihood. If this protection is taken away a worker is left with no effective alternative protection.
My hon. Friend the Member for Brent-ford and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe) made

clear in his admirable speech that where a closed shop agreement is in operation there could be no effective challenge by a worker to dismissal from employment and forfeiture of his livelihood if he declined to belong to a specified union. The dismissal would be fair beyond all legal argument because the statute would clearly say so. Every employer would naturally come under increasing pressure to take action by way of dismissal whenever this situation arose in the context of a closed shop. No matter how reputable, public-spirited and conscientious in its members' interests a union may be, if it is not the specified union within an agreement its virtues and the preferences of individual workers would count for nothing.
No doubt we shall again have the argument that the statute, as amended, will not derogate from common law rights. I concede that this is true. If an individual is dismissed for refusal to join a specified union he can sue for wrongful dismissal in the courts, even though his recourse to the industrial tribunal will have been taken away. But the House must consider how much practical use such action would be to a worker. His action will arise in contract and, therefore, he will, at best, get damages for breach of that contract assessed on the length of notice due to him under his contract of employment. He will not get reinstatement because courts do not grant specific performance for contracts of personal service. His contract of employment, under which he can sue in the courts, will reflect the union membership agreement.
The 1974 Act says:
Union membership agreement means an agreement or arrangement which … has the effect of requiring the terms and conditions of employment of every employee of that class to include a condition that he must be or become a member of the union or one of the unions which is or are parties to the agreement …
When he sues under his contract of employment he will be suing under a contract which will bind him to the closed shop agreement.
Like the person expelled or excluded from a union, a worker dismissed for insisting on his preference for an unspecified union, even if otherwise wholly excellent, will have no effective remedy if he is deprived of recourse to an industrial tribunal.

Mr. Booth: I do not wish to challenge what the right hon. and learned Gentleman has just said, but perhaps I could draw his attention to Clause 2(3) of the Bill which amends the words he was quoting. The words
of requiring the terms and conditions of employment of every employee of that class to include a condition that he must
will be replaced by the words
in practice of requiring employees for the time being of the class to which it relates (whether or not there is a condition to that effect in their contract of employment) to".
This will allow union membership agreements to specify whether they would apply to the employee in question.

Sir D. Walker-Smith: I do not think that is a very valuable amendment. It is left to the agreement to determine the matter. The individual worker, if stripped of his right to go to a tribunal, will not, I think, have any effective remedy left.
That will be the situation of people in the position of the Ferrybridge Six. They have their remedy now because the 1974 Act is still in force in the form in which it was passed by Parliament, against the wishes of many Labour Members. In the form now proposed, these people will have no such rights. An exactly similar case today, however reasonable and conscientious, will go by default if the Government's proposals are carried. People in this situation will become the Tolpuddle Martyrs of the future, with the added poignancy that their fellow trade unionists, far from according them help and sympathy, will be accessories to the fact, like Saul of Tarsus in the stoning of St. Stephen. It is not inappropriate to refer to martyrdom in this context, because in connection with Tolpuddle it has become part of the hagiology of the trade union movement. It is not an extravagant use of language to say that to deprive a man of his livelihood is to put him to economic martyrdom.
8.0 p.m.
We find a strange and striking paradox. We in the twentieth century believe that insistence on belonging to any particular religion or sect is unthinkable and the use of pains and penalties to secure such conformity even worse. Yet, however perverse and odious such persecution was, those who were inflicting it for religious reasons in former days were

doing so not because they conceived it to be in their own advantage, but in the mistaken belief that it was in the interests of the victim and his ultimate salvation. After all, Mary Tudor burnt Cranmer, Latimer and Ridley at the stake in the belief, however repugnant it may seem to us, that she was saving them from worse and more lasting conflagration thereafter.
However, insistence on the closed shop conformity, the imposition of penalties for non-conformity and the deprivation of rights, does not purport to be in the individual interest of those affected. It is simply and solely to facilitate the collective arrangements as being easier and more convenient if everyone is shepherded into the same pen. I understand that, and I recognise the possible administrative and practical advantages of a single, collective identity in the context of collective bargaining. I recognise also that there may be those whose motives for resisting membership of a specified union might not be conscientious. However, there are others whose motives are and that distinction would be precisely a matter for the tribunal.
The present wording of the Act gives no automatic right to resist dismissal on the grounds of refusal to become or remain a member of a specified union. It must be shown that the grounds of objection to belonging are reasonable in each case, and each case will be judged by reasonable and objective men and women in the tribunal. However, if no such right or remedy exists, whatever reasonable grounds of objection there might be, a person would be dismissed.
Where would he go in those circumstances to secure other employment? That is the vital question. He will find it progressively more difficult, as the practice of closed shop agreements extends, to find alternative employment at which to earn his bread.
A matter which became very topical a few months ago concerned the position over unemployment benefit in such circumstances. A good deal of heat was engendered in this matter and the Secretary of State entered into the correspondence columns of The Times. I shall not put this matter in any strong or heated way, simply in an analytical and interrogatory way. Sufficient case was made of it


by The Times to justify inquiry. The withholding of unemployment benefit for a period is governed by Section 14 of the Social Security Act 1973. That is a different statute. When the Secretary of State wrote his letter on the matter he said in effect that they were different statutes, different provisions, and different tribunals, and that never the twain shall meet. He disposed of it in that way. However, the problem clearly arises. Under Section 14(2) of that Act
A person shall be disqualified for receiving unemployment benefit for such period not exceeding 6 weeks … if … he has lost his employment as an employed earner through his misconduct, or has voluntarily left such employment without just cause".
To be dismissed because he does not belong to a closed shop is not in the ordinary use of the word "misconduct". However, can it not be argued that conduct which has justified dismissal which Parliament has specifically said in terms is fair dismissal is tantamount to misconduct? It cannot be said that he left voluntarily, because he was dismissed. Could it not be argued that a person who is fairly dismissed with just cause is in a similar case to one who leaves voluntarily without just cause?
After the initial position fresh problems will arise. The person is also disqualified from benefit after he has neglected to avail himself of a reasonable opportunity of suitable employment o after a situation in any suitable employment has been notified to him as vacant and he has, without good cause, failed to apply for it. Take the case where the employment is suitable in every respect except that it carries the obligation to belong to a closed shop. If the Government proposal is carried may it not become impossible for the dismissed worker to say that the alternative employment offered is not suitable on the grounds that he has a conscientious objection or a reasonable objection to belonging to the specified union? He would find it difficult in the terms of the Act as proposed to be amended.
The House has the duty to ask how the tribunals under the Social Security Act are to interpret these provisions in Section 14 concerning unemployment benefit if the Government proposal is carried. At least the tribunals should know what Parliament means the position to be in

such a situation, but according to the right hon. Gentleman they will not be told because it is a different Act and that is someone else's concern. And so the position is that, without guidance, the local insurance tribunals will encounter difficulties with the obvious possibility of different tribunals coming to different conclusions on the same facts. Perhaps the test case will come through the National Insurance Commissioner on a point of law to be decided by the courts. The courts will then have the duty to decide what Parliament intended. It will be a very difficult duty when the Government themselves, in proposing the amendment, seem to have no idea what they intend Parliament to mean in respect of the unemployment benefit situation under the 1973 Act.
We therefore come to the reluctant and regretful conclusion that there is—and to this extent at any rate The Times was right—the clear possibility that a worker who is dismissed for refusing to belong to a specified union in a closed shop agreement may be prejudiced in his rights to benefit as well as in his prospects of employment. If that is so it will be turning this minority of independent-minded men into latter day Ishmaelites, with every man's hand against them. That is surely repugnant in a community such as ours with a long tradition of tolerance.
Closed shop arrangements no doubt have their advantages and qualities, and no one today would dissent from that. They no doubt make collective bargaining easier, and that is a good thing and a practical advantage. Similarly, large and dominant trade unions have in collective bargaining advantages of a practical nature which we should all recognise. Certainly, these large and dominant unions—which will become the specified unions in the closed shop agreements—and the TUC have a giant strength. It should be used gently, with due regard to the rights of individuals and nonconformists who have reasonable grounds for not wishing to belong to a trade union. As Shakespeare put it in "Measure for Measure":

"O! it is excellent
To have a giant's strength, but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant."

Mr. James Dempsey: It is extremely difficult to follow the reasoning behind the speeches we


have heard from the Opposition Benches. The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) closed by quoting Shakespeare. I begin by quoting the title of Shakespeare's play "Much ado about nothing", which seems to be the Opposition's attitude. Apparently, the mere fact that an individual is told that he should belong to a certain union results in all these extraordinary complications—the determination of to which union he should belong, the possibility of his losing his job, the operation of the local insurance tribunal, what will happen when the commissioner decides the case, and whether it will go to law. This simple issue has been taken everywhere except to the House of Lords by a test case.
That is an absurd approach to the problem. I have belonged to a trade union for nearly 40 years and I have been in closed shop employment. None of the grotesque fantasies expressed by the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East ever arose. The system must have been worked out by an inventive genius. An individual in any shop or factory who gets the benefit of trade union organisation should pay for it. Union members contribute weekly—I still do—towards the staff, the office and the payment of full-time organisers to protect the interests of working people and to achieve decent working conditions by labour agreements. It is morally wrong that individuals who refuse to make that contribution should get the benefit of those agreements without paying a halfpenny towards the cost. I am surprised that Opposition Members should advocate such a course.

Mr. Hayhoe: Time and again from the Opposition Benches in Committee and on the Floor of the House we have made clear that the changes we propose would not be for the benefit of the free rider. We have tabled amendments to cover that. I do not want the hon. Gentleman to go ahead with his speech on a misconception. We do not seek to support the free rider, the guy who wants the benefits of union membership but who is too mean to pay his dues. That person does not have our support.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. Dempsey: The speeches we have heard from the Opposition Benches tonight

have not given that impression. I have been the chairman and secretary of my trade union and in all my experience I have never known anyone refuse to join the trade union, not even those who belonged to a strict religious sect. I have heard of instances when, on grounds of religious conviction, one or two people have opted out, but arrangements were made for them to make a contribution equal to the union dues to the charity of their choice.

Mr. Prior: We support the hon. Gentleman entirely in what he says. Why is he making this attack on us? We have been saying precisely that over months and years.

Mr. Dempsey: I am attacking the two speeches that I have heard tonight and that sought to convince hon. Members that by encouraging the closed shop they were introducing tendencies to be abhorred, tendencies not belonging to our democratic traditions. The argument started with a person being dismissed from his employment and it culminated in a test case before a commissioner to decide whether he was eligible to receive unemployment benefit. I have never known that to happen.
Why should not we have a closed shop? A closed shop is an arrangement by which every worker in the establishment contributes to the union, or to a noble cause, and enjoys the benefits of trade union organisation. We have operated such a system in which every individual belonged to the trade union, with the exception of those with religious convictions. The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East wishes to encourage people to give all sorts of reasons for not belonging to a trade union. That is an unacceptable argument.
It has been said that an individual should decide for himself which union to join. I cannot imagine anything more ludicrous than for a shop assistant to apply to join the NUM or for a miner to apply to join the shop assistants' trade union. In each undertaking a certain type of job is done or a certain type of service provided. There is an association of work-people to cater for each type of employment. If there is any difficulty about deciding to which union a person should belong, he has recourse


to the trade union machinery. There is also a dispute committee of the TUC in England and Wales and of the Scottish TUC. That body intervenes. It is a matter between the relevant unions. A decision is reached about to which union the person should belong and the matter is solved without recourse to the grotesque complexities of which we have heard tonight.
The Government's proposition is realistic, whereas the amendment is unrealistic. I have never known anyone to be dismissed for not belonging to a trade union. I have never known anyone to be face to face with the possibility of losing unemployment benefit. That problem has never arisen in my experience, and it should not arise if there is responsible leadership from the trade union movement on the one hand and the employers on the other.
Good will and understanding in matters of that sort can result in the closed shop principle being embraced not only by the trade unions, but by the employers. I have had the experience in my lifetime of employers appealing for a closed shop to ensure, for example, the convenience of wage negotiations and negotiations for improvements in conditions of work. Employers have wanted the closed shop to prevent fragmented negotiations between one section and another, negotiations that would devour essential management time that should have been devoted to production, looking for orders and expanding the business.
I have known employers to appeal to heaven in their efforts to have one trade union covering all their workers so that one set of negotiations could solve problems and enable management to get on with its business. That has been my experience of the closed shop in practice.
The closed shop was operating before I started work, and I was only a young boy when I joined a trade union in those conditions. It is still operating in the same way after nearly half a century, and we have never lost one day's production from industrial action. In my lifetime as a trade unionist I have never known what it is to be involved in a strike.
My experience indicates that the closed shop should be welcomed by industry,

by the trade union movement, by the Government and by society. Properly handled, properly operated and properly managed, it would be a boon for this country.

Mr. David Madel: We in the Conservative Party agree with the hon. Member for Coat-bridge and Airdrie (Mr. Dempsey) about the need for maximum good will and understanding on both sides of industry, but the hon. Member appeared to be taking us into a land of eccentricity when he suggested that we were somehow drafting amendments that would result in shop assistants trying to join the miners' union, or vice versa. I do not think that the hon. Member has followed our arguments closely enough.
This is about the eighth time in some 15 months that we have tried to explain to the Government our desire to ameliorate this rigid rule about joining a particular trade union. Every time we debate this subject I am reminded of what hon. Members opposite used to say when we were putting forward our 1971 Act. They said then that in this country we needed loose, informal arrangements between the Government and the TUC and loose arrangements within the TUC rather than the rigid rules and the military type discipline that the Conservative Government—according to those hon. Members—were putting forward. Yet here we see a very rigid rule on the subject of having to belong to a particular trade union.
Is there really so much feeling within the trade union movement against the principle that someone with reasonable grounds of conscience need not belong to a particular trade union? Are trade unions not prepared to live with a few people on the factory floor who will not join a particular union because they have a genuine conscientious objection to doing so? Surely all industrial experience shows that unions will tolerate that situation, that there can be peaceful co-existence.
Why force the pace? Why create trouble by bringing forward this new condition? The hon. Member said that he had never heard of anyone being kicked out of a job for refusing to join a particular union. In today's Financial


Times there is a headline, "Petition on BR Writer". The report states that:
About 50 union members from British Rail Eastern Region"—
not members of a national housewives' league or some such body—
are today sending a petition to Sir Richard Marsh, BR's chairman, in protest at the threatened dismissal of a white-collar employee who refuses to join a union under the industry's closed shop agreement. The employee involved, Mr. David Blackwell, a feature write for BR's staff journal, is awaiting further action by the management following a recent verbal warning that he faced dismissal for failing to join one of the three rail unions in line with the agreement that came into effect last August.
Mr. Blackwell has an address in South Bedfordshire and has approached me as his Member of Parliament. As I understand it, he is willing to join the Institute of Journalists. But the most important aspect of this vital piece of news in today's Financial Times is that one of the organisers of the petition has said that the purpose was
to show what the 'grass roots' union members felt about forcing employees to join a closed shop.
This situation has not existed on British Rail for years, and we on the Conservative side cannot understand why the Government insist on forcing the pace and creating a great deal of trouble for themselves.
There are three reason why somebody might object to belonging to a particular union. He might not like its policy at the time. He might know of a case where the union had failed to carry out its agreement and obligations to an individual member. He might object to the union's party-political affiliation. These can all change. Unions may decide to support a particular political party in the future which is not to the liking of a member or a person who is expected to join.
We have said again and again that this is a Government who tell us that they are preaching tranquillity. We have a Prime Minister who is trying to combine the réles of President Eisenhower and Mr. Baldwin with a policy of "Take it easy, nothing drastic, safety first." Yet this Government will not agree to a very modest change in their proposals concerning the closed shop.
These proposals will cause trouble and encourage people to challenge unions on them. Where there has been industrial

peace when people have not belonged to a particular union because of a genuine conscientious objection, why disturb that peace? Why risk trouble? The Government are putting industrial peace at risk by their insistence on these propsals. They are utterly unnecessary and the Secretary of State should think again.

Mr. Emlyn Hooson: We are really concerned in this debate with how wide a conscience clause should be in the circumstances discussed.
Paragraph 6(5) of Schedule 1 to the principal Act resulted from a Liberal amendment in this House. It was the right kind of compromise, which is so often necessary in modern industrial conditions, between the interests of the group and the interests of the individual—the freedom of the group and the freedom of the individual.
There is a very heavy onus on the Government to justify the change they propose in the principal Act. What mischief are they trying to remedy? This paragraph has been in operation in the principal Act for 18 months. Has it caused any difficulty? From what quarter does the pressure arise? The provision in paragraph 6(5) of Schedule 1 should be permitted to remain, for the simple reason that otherwise there is a risk of a grave personal injustice being done. It is not that the risk is widespread. I do not think it is.
With great respect to the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith), who adumbrated the view that a man might be deprived of his unemployment benefit if he were sacked in these circumstances, I could not follow his reasoning. I should have thought it would be difficult for any tribunal to hold that a man had been dismissed for misconduct in these circumstances, or had voluntarily given up his employment.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman was on firmer ground when he suggested that a man might be deprived of unemployment benefit which he was already receiving if he was offered alternative employment which had an additional requirement. However, I did not follow to the same conclusion as did the right hon. and learned Gentleman the first part of his argument.

Sir D. Walker-Smith: I did not conclude that it could be construed as misconduct or as voluntarily leaving. In fact, I said expressly that, in the ordinary meaning of the language, clearly it was not. But it might be argued in the future that there was an analogous situation and that it was not clear. I quite agree that the second position is the more dangerous; that is to say, it would be held that a man had refused suitable alternative employment because he was not prepared to join a closed shop.

8.30 p.m.

Mr. Hooson: I am glad to see that we are not very far apart in our understanding of the position.
To revert to the main argument, however, it seems to me that it is very much like the case of a conscientious objector in war time, when it is always argued that a conscientious objector is being carried by those who are prepared to fight to defend their country. There are those who have always argued against the rights of a conscientious objector. There are others who say that any rights should be restricted to those with religious objections and so on.
It has been argued by Government supporters with regard to the position here that there should be a very narrow conscience clause restricted to those who have a conscientious objection to belonging to a union on religious or some other grounds. I do not see why that should be. I can conceive of circumstances in which a person genuinely has an objection to belonging to a certain trade union. Why should he be deprived of employment on those grounds and then be unable to recover damages by way of compensation before a tribunal?
There is a heavy onus on the Government. If they are anxious for industrial peace—and they have moved a considerable distance in convincing right hon. and hon. Members on the Opposition Benches of the need for a closed shop in modern industrial conditions in many circumstances—I think that they are pushing it in trying to reverse this provision in the principal Act.
On those grounds I shall support the amendment.

Mr. Booth: The effect of this amendment would be to retain a provision in

our law for unfair dismissal compensation to be paid to anyone dismissed for noncompliance with a union membership agreement if he satisfies an industrial tribunal that he has reasonable grounds for objecting to membership of a particular trade union.
This provision has been operating for some time and we can make a judgment about whether it is effective for the purposes for which it was added to our legislation. I have to tell the House that of all the cases which tribunals have considered under this provision in only two have they found that the applicants have had reasonable grounds for objecting to membership of a particular union and in neither of those cases have the tribunals decided that the persons concerned should be re-engaged or reinstated in their previous employment.
I disagree slightly with the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe), because we are concerned not only with whether there should be financial compensation but with unfair dismissal cases generally and, in the specific case covered by the amendment, with whether a person should be reinstated in his employment. Paragraph 17(2) of Schedule 1 lays a duty on the tribunals to consider whether re-engagement is practicable in a case under consideration and whether to order that there should be reinstatement. However, it is now quite clear that a great number of people have been encouraged to go to tribunals in the belief that they may persuade them that they have reasonable grounds for objecting to being members of a particular union and have been disappointed.
I suggest that human considerations show that that is not surprising. I doubt whether anyone would take the view that his reasons for objecting to belonging to a particular union were unreasonable, or whether any hon. Member arguing in favour of or against this amendment would regard his reasons as being anything but reasonable.
This provision has therefore had the ill-effect of encouraging people to seek the protection of the tribunal rather than comply with the conditions of the union membership agreement. By the time those individuals discover that the tribunal will not endorse their view that


their grounds for objection are reasonable, they have lost their job and are unable to recover it. Further, in all but two cases they have been unable to receive financial compensation.

Mr. Hooson: The Minister has referred to two cases in which it was found that there were reasonable grounds. Out of how many cases was that? When he says that the provision has encouraged people to go to the tribunals, may we know how many have gone?

Mr. Booth: I have not got the precise figures, but I shall try to obtain them. My impression has been that over the past 12 months or so we have seen the application of the union membership agreement much more widely and rapidly than ever before, possibly, in our history. It is reasonable to suppose that the number of cases that have come forward in the past 15 months has been more than would generally be the case. I think that it has been a fair test period.

Mr. Hayhoe: If the Minister says that it is two cases out of 30, 40 or 50, that will not seem too bad a score. If it is two cases out of 10, we shall want to consider that. There needs to be a balance in these matters. If we are providing a remedy that has been effective in a significant percentage of cases, it seems that it would be desirable to continue providing it.

Mr. Booth: I now have the number. I have been advised that the number of complainants who have gone to the tribunals is 40. My point is that not one has been successful in obtaining reinstatement or re-engagement. That is significant. The provision is such that by the time the complainants discover the ruling of the tribunal, they are without a job. In the overwhelming majority of cases, if this test period gives us any guidance, they are without financial compensation, too.

Mr. Hayhoe: The Minister emphasises that the recommendation has not been for reinstatement or re-engagement, but there is a certain disingenuousness about that argument. He knows perfectly well, because we went over the matter time and again during the passage of the Employment Protection Act, that—as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for

Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) has pointed out—there is no obligation for an order to be made reinstating someone, and ensuring that there is specific performance of a contract of employment. All that is involved is that in certain circumstances, if an order for reinstatement is made, higher compensation may be paid. It is on the financial side that we ought to be looking. Perhaps those who go to the tribunal seeking a remedy in these circumstances are looking for some financial compensation.

Mr. Booth: I cannot agree with the hon. Gentleman about that. If hon. Members are concerned only about financial compensation, it is strange that they have approved the provisions of Section 106 and paragraph 17 of Schedule 1 laying upon tribunals a specific duty to consider whether it is practicable, in accordance with equity, for the complainant to be reinstated or re-engaged.
I put it to the hon. Member that in subsequent debate on the Employment Protection Act we gave further consideration to the circumstances in which it would be practicable to give effect to reinstatement or re-engagement. The House has been concerned about it. If as a House we formed the judgment that we could not ultimately enforce this and that in such circumstances the best course would be to give greater compensation, I do not believe that that would be because the majority felt that in any circumstances it was not desirable to attempt in so far as was practicable to ensure that in certain circumstances the decision of an industrial tribunal should result in someone being reinstated or re-engaged. That is an important consideration and the House has shown that it wishes to be able to find the solution in law if that is possible.
We must also consider the undesirable side effects of the provision. Employers and trade unions can avoid its difficulties by following a pre-entry rather than a post-entry closed shop. The House should give no encouragement to employers or trade unions to form pre-entry rather than post-entry closed shops or vice versa. I have always maintained that the law should be neutral over whether there should be a closed shop.
The measure should do nothing to encourage the formation or non-formation


of a closed shop, but should leave it to the trade unionists and employers to decide. They are in the best position to judge whether it is desirable to have a trade union membership agreement in their employment circumstances and in their premises. If they so decide, they are the best people to know how it should apply and whether people should be excluded or included. Our attitude on the amendment is consistent with that position. Even if the words
reasonable grounds for objecting to membership of a union
were included within the union agreement and those involved were seeking to comply with the legislation, they would still cause difficulties in interpretation, difficulties which have faced the tribunal and resulted in only two out of 40 complainants obtaining protection.
I have been asked to refer to the position of the Ferrybridge Six. It is a fair point that if the Bill is passed without the amendment, a defence now available to people in that position will be removed. We do not yet know when the industrial tribunal will finally reach a decision and publish it. There has been a long and complex hearing of the unfair dismissal case. It has raised a number of difficult points which the unclear state of our law has not helped.
There is no question of the decision being deliberately help up. Tribunals are completely independent. My right hon. Friend has no power to intervene. Tribunals have spent some time in reaching a decision on several cases in the past year. Therefore, this case is not peculiar in taking this length of time.
There have been questions about when the insurance officer's decision will be known. He will announce his decision when he is satisfied that he has the full information necessary to make it. I understand that he has found some people from whom he has sought necessary information not always to be forthcoming with it. There may be an appeal to a commissioner about that. If I or my right hon. Friend were to announce to the House the sort of decision which we wanted the national insurance officer to reach on an application for unemployment benefit, and if he heeded our words

and made his decision accordingly, it would be a bad way of making law and amending the social security legislation.

Mr. Hayhoe: I agree that law should not be made by Ministers in the way the right hon. Gentleman has just described. But can he tell us the current unemployment benefit position of the individuals concerned? I understand that these individuals who have been dismissed for not conforming with a closed shop agreement are being denied unemployment benefit. Of course one recognises that as the procedures will be implemented throughout the matter may be put right at a later stage.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. Booth: My understanding accords with that of the hon. Gentleman. I understand that they are not receiving unemployment benefit or, as far as I know, supplementary benefit, but I should have to check to confirm that. However, that was the position when I last inquired.
I should like to point out that the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth misrepresented the Government when he said that we had stuck to an extreme position and were seeking to impose a brutal penalty by advising the House to reject the amendment. He is wrong to say that. We have not stuck to an extreme position. We have listened carefully to all the representations made to us on this issue and we have taken on board the importance rightly attached to the effects on individual employees of the making of union membership agreements.
We have amended and modified the legislation and proposed amendments seeking to obtain a different solution to the problem from that advocated by the Opposition amendment. We have sought to find a solution in terms of enabling those who make union membership agreements—in so far as those agreements affect unfair dismissal compensation—to make them as flexible as possible, to exclude or include individuals and, even after they have made those agreements, to vary them by tacit agreement. That is one of the proposals before the House.
If hon. Gentlemen care to consider the amendment to paragraph 6(5) of Schedule 1, which complements the Government amendment to Clause 2(3), they will see


that, by removing the reference to "all employees" and inserting
employees for the time being
in the wording giving guidance to the tribunals in determining whether there is a union membership agreement applying to dismissed employees, we are adding flexibility to closed shop agreements and the way they are or are not enforced by employers. Moreover, we are encouraging the tribunals not to take a rigid line on what constitutes a valid membership agreement.
By deleting the reference to "all employees" we are implying that if an occasion arises when an individual who appears to be covered by a union membership agreement is not a union member but is not dismissed, that does not necessarily invalidate the union agreement. By inserting the words "for the time being" we are intending to lay stress on the current practice concerning who is covered by a union membership agreement.
Therefore, it will be possible, whatever the original arrangement or agreement at a particular place of employment, to acknowledge that it has become tacitly accepted that certain individuals do not need to join. Those who have reached that tacit agreement will not be invalidating the union membership agreement but updating it and the tribunals will he entitled to take account of that. The two amendments to which I have referred are, I hope, the last of a great many that the Government have brought forward to amend the definition of union membership agreements and other provisions of the Bill to enable union membership agreements to work flexibly.
The hon. Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Madel) asked whether unions would live with a situation where a few people were not willing to join. My experience is that in the vast majority of cases they will live with that situation. That is one of the reasons why there are closed shop agreements which ignore or exclude people who have been in firms for a number of years and which require only certain provisions to apply to those who joined the firm after a specific date. It is also one reason why the majority of employers and trade unions have determined not to operate closed shop or union membership agreements.
The Government believe that this is a matter for employers and trade unions. We believe that we should take a neutral position and not seek to continue a provision that will encourage people to think that they can make a successful challenge on the ground that they have some reasonable objection to union membership in a way that often results in their being not only disappointed but out of a job. We believe that if this provision were to be changed, it would militate against the provision that the law does not seek to deter employers from signing membership agreements by making them liable in many cases for compensation for unfair dismissal. We seek to maintain a neutral position and it can be achieved by rejecting the amendment.

Mr. Kenneth Clarke: I last took part in a debate in this Chamber on the closed shop and its effect on a few individuals about nine months ago. I realise that the Minister has been round the course several times. Therefore, I make no criticism that he seems a little jaded as he is going over fairly familiar ground.
I hoped that when the right hon. Gentleman intervened something new might come from him. Although he referred to two minuscule alterations which he believed the Government had made, in essence I found that he was sticking to the position, which I regard as extreme, to which he was adhering nine months ago.
However, nothing new appears ever to occur to the Minister and no argument appears capable of deflecting him. For instance, I was astonished when the right hon. Gentleman used as argument that only two people have succeeded before tribunals. When it was pointed out to him that that figure was meaningless unless it was related to the number of applications to tribunals, he turned to those advising him and made no secret of the fact that the figure of 40 total applications came as a complete surprise. Despite the fact that it made his quotation of only two successful claimants almost meaningless, the right hon. Gentleman carried on as though it had no effect on his argument.
Contrary to what the right hon. Gentleman asserted, however, two successful


claimants out of 40 shows that the provision which was written into the legislation in the last Session of Parliament in the period of the minority Government causes no inconvenience to tribunals, causes no major upheaval in industrial relations, is not actively being challenged by many people and is not causing a dramatic change in the trade union movement. However, the Government are determined to try to reverse it.

Mr. Booth: Will the hon. Gentleman at least allow that the figure of 40 is of no significance whatsoever unless it is considered against the background of the number of union membership agreements made within the period? I am relating the figure of two—who received only financial compensation, not reinstatement—to a period in which there had been significant developments in the formation of union membership agreements.

Mr. Clarke: I shall relate the 40 to the number of possible claims which might be pending, some of which are within my knowledge, which is a relevant consideration. I realise that the extension of union agreements was bound to follow the Government's declared intention. The opportunity to challenge agreements where individual rights are interfered with is being used modestly, is sometimes being used successfully by a few claimants and should be tolerated by the Government because it is causing no disruption to anybody.
Perhaps I should make it clear, since it has been challenged, that I and my hon. Friends believe that we know the value to the trade unions of the closed shop agreement because it can be a valuable addition to bargaining power, and that we know the value to many major employers of satisfactory closed shop arrangements with the obvious and sensible negotiating unions. I also appreciate the legitimate anger of trade unionists about the pure "free rider", the man who determines to opt out of union membership and avoid paying his dues while intending to take advantage of union negotiations on his behalf. In those circumstances a proper closed shop can be a valuable addition to industrial relations, as long as it is exercised with common sense, the tolerance for unusual cases and the respect for individuals which should

command universal support in the House.
A few years ago I might have been persuaded that, if the Government had their way, such was the usual common sense of industrial relations that one could rely on the fact that few people would try to persecute a worthwhile and deserving individual under this protection. If the hon. Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie (Mr. Dempsey) were in a dominant position in the trade union movement still, I might have been content to leave to men such as he flexibility and discretion not to prosecute individuals.
In recent months and years, however, I have begun to fear that the kind of immunities that the Government intend will lead to abuse and, in a few cases, to real persecution of individuals. The principle of solidarity is being used to browbeat sensible and reasonable people.
Another feature of the closed shop agreement as it may be enshrined in this legislation is that it can be used to maintain a monopoly bargaining position for unions which would otherwise lose members in an industry because they had ceased to command the respect and support of a large numer of members who wanted to look for alternative representation.
The matter on which I wish to dwell to illustrate this is the present and worrying example of the attempt to exterminate the Electricity Supply Union. The Ferrybridge Six case is before a tribunal, so that one cannot go further into that. But I would not want the House to be led into the belief, as some people may be outside, that only six members of that union at one Yorkshire power station are affected. In fact, the right to work of several dozen people is in jeopardy and the personal liberty of several hundreds is being put at risk at this moment.
I say that not to put forward grotesque fantasies, as the hon. Member for Coat-bridge and Airdrie suggested, but because of the experience in Nottinghamshire in and around my constituency. At Ratcliffeon-Soar in my constituency is the largest coal-fired power station in the United Kingdom. Nearby at Wilford is a smaller, old-fashioned coal-fired station. The ESU was strong at both. Of the total work


force of 480 at Ratcliffe-on-Soar, 240 were members of the ESU. About 300 men work at Wilford, of whom 50 were members of the ESU. Of those 290 members, about half were also members of one of the other unions in the industry. Therefore, far from being free riders, they belonged to one of the signatory unions to the present agreement but, in addition, were prepared to pay for additional representation by the ESU.
9.0 p.m.
They were untroubled until trouble came to a climax at Ferrybridge in November last year. Since that time the position of the ESU members, in the last few months particularly, has deteriorated very rapidly indeed. The majority of the ESU members who were not dual members have now been interviewed by the management, and all have been warned of their default of contract.
What has happened is that the vast majority of men, with their work put in jeopardy, have agreed to surrender their ESU cards, and a high proportion of those who were not dual members have agreed to join one of the signatory unions. However, about 35 to 40 of the men have decided that they will have to join a signatory union but have applied to join a signatory union other than the union to which they originally belonged before they took out ESU membership.
Their applications were sent in. Some members actually received membership cards and began to pay subscriptions to the union they now wish to join. However, since 11th December all those applications have been suspended pending an inquiry into previous union membership.
What happened was that a signatory union official sent off a letter of complaint referring to a minute of the NJIC meeting which makes it clear that it was the intention of the signatory unions that all members who had left a signatory union should return to the particular union which they had left and should not be allowed even to exercise the choice of joining another signatory union which was party to the new agreement that is being enforced and insisted upon.
Therefore, hundreds of men have had their freedom to belong to the ESU ended. Most have fallen in with going back to their former trade union. About 35 to 40 are at present at risk of losing

their jobs, not because they do not want to pay subscriptions and not because they do not want to join a union which is a party to the industry's agreement but because they have the temerity to seek to belong to another union that is party to the agreement but is other than that to which they had previously belonged.
I assure Labour Members who may feel that those 35 or 40 men are in some way unreasonable or unusual and cannot be tolerated that almost without exception they are long-standing trade union members, and most of them have been Labour voters for all their adult lives; some may even remain so following this legislation. But they are perfectly ordinary, reasonable trade unionists who are being persecuted in anticipation of the legislation which this House is being asked to pass.
That is disgraceful. I do not think that this was in the Government's mind when they brought this proposal forward, but they are blinding themselves to the fact that that kind of use will be made of the provisions that they are proposing to enact.
Often when hon. Members make a direct attack on the closed shop in industry they are accused of being naïve about industrial relations and of not having any real feel or experience about these matters. I believe that it is Labour Members who are being naïve about the fact that they feel they can rely on traditional trade union values and what they believe to be the common sense of the trade union movement to apply in every case, so that they can be confident that no sensible, reasonable individual will be persecuted as a result of what they do. I believe, however, that they will have disciplines applied to them that are out of all proportion to any affront they have offered to the trade union movement in the past. It is a disgrace that this should be done to those in my constituency and others who are members of the ESU who risk losing their livelihoods.
This kind of discrimination can occur in relation to many other matters. Discrimination of this kind on grounds of sex, race and religion would be regarded as an intolerable disgrace by 99 per cent. of hon. Members. But discrimination on the grounds of a sensible political decision and a sensible industrial decision


which happens not to be agreed with by the dominant trade unions in the industry is now to have the approval of the present Government. I cannot believe even at this stage that Labour Members ought to allow themselves to press that sort of opinion on the House.

Mr. Bulmer: I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman for not having heard what he said, but I understand that he did not make any concessions.
I should like to put to the Minister the position of a constituent of mine who came to this country a number of years ago because he had a great respect for its traditions of concern for the liberty of the individual. He now finds himself in a position in which he feels that he will lose his job because he is not prepared to join a trade union.
My constituent wrote me in these terms:
I am a very strong believer in unions, but unions should be so good and attractive that every worker would want to join, not have to be forced to become members. To join a club, the rule book of which I don't like or believe in, is ludicrous. I find it absolutely unbelievable that you can approve the idea of anyone being forcibly made to sign a form which makes the secretary of whichever union they join their political spokesman …
Union funds are used to sponsor MPs and for countless other political purposes. All union secretaries attend Labour Party conferences every year voting and speaking, not representing themselves but on behalf of the union. Sir, no one has the right to speak on my behalf on political matters without my consent. My political spokesman is my MP, and that applies to every person in the country. Union leaders were elected to represent working men of all political beliefs in the matter of industry …".

Mr. Bidwell: The hon. Gentleman is reading absolute nonsense. The trade union general secretaries who attend Labour Party conferences are few and far between. Not all TUC unions are affiliated to the Labour Party. Why does the hon. Gentleman read this letter as representing the truth? It is written by an amateur and it is obviously being presented by another amateur.

Mr. Bulmer: This man is my constituent and he feels that he is about to lose his job. Labour Members are usually very concerned if their constituents are about to lose their jobs—

Mr. Bidwell: Rubbish.

Mr. Bulmer: The hon. Gentleman says "Rubbish". Is he not concerned?

Mr. Bidwell: Read on.

Mr. Bulmer: My constituent will be interested to read the hon. Gentleman's intervention. My constituent has come to this country ready to learn, but I believe that he has a point. I believe that the House should listen to what he has to say.
The letter continues:
Union leaders were elected to represent working men of all political beliefs in the matter of industry and its relationships, not … to interfere in other matters of government.
It then states:
From an early age I was a member of the Socialist Youth movement as my parents and their friends were members of the Social Democratic party.
He was by birth a Sudeten German.
He then describes how National Socialism took over in his country and the problems with which he was faced. He writes:
In 1939 when I was about to start my first job, I was asked whether I was a member of the Hitler Youth. As I was not, there was no job for me. Now, it could be the unions who will be telling me to either join their ranks or else be thrown on the 'scrap heap' no matter how good a worker I am or how skilled in my job I am. Can you please tell me where the difference between the two lies?
What can I say to my constituent? Perhaps the Minister will answer for me. Here is a man who has seen and suffered the evolution of the corporate State in what is about its nastiest form. He can see the powers of the State increasing and expanding into every facet of life. He senses quite accurately how powerless the individual is if he chooses to resist. To where can he turn for shelter? To plead conscience or to show reasonable grounds is a defence that the Government are determined to strip away. Ministers who are so fond of quoting Donovan when it suits them choose to pass by on the other side.
If the House decides to allow access to a tribunal neither to a man who refuses to join a trade union on reasonable grounds nor to a man who believes that he has been wrongfully expelled it will be abrogating its responsibilities. The Labour Party feels that it has much to


gain from extending the power of trade unions. By extending their powers it will have a greater income and a greater leverage in industry and will be able to provide a rougher ride for its political opponents. If, however, it greatly strengthens their powers, has it not a parallel duty to protect the rights of individuals from the abuse of such power? Even the New Statesman has felt that it has to comment on the rise of the know-nothing Left.
My constituent has sometimes had a great deal of difficulty in making his point. Perhaps he has experienced that difficulty because he comes from another country. He is told to shut up as he is a bloody foreigner if what he says is unpopular. We in this House cannot put this matter aright overnight.
My constituent continues:
Before closing I would like to make one more reference to your belief that all or more union members should participate in branch meetings and its business. If you worked on the shop floor you might understand better into which categories workers fall. A relatively small percentage is organised and all out to destroy. Another small percentage see where it is all leading because they have sufficient political knowledge but are powerless because they cannot use the same forceful methods as they have not the support of the leadership. At least 65 per cent. are either too frightened, too apathetic or have no knowledge of union business or politics. Should the fact that they either do not want to, or genuinely cannot, take part give the destroyers a 'blank cheque' to do what they like with the lives of the rest?
My constituent is writing about the factory in which he works. It the House is not prepared to defend him he must look elsewhere, and probably the best place to which to turn is to other members of trade unions. Recent research has revealed that one-half or more of workers thought that it wrong that workers should be compelled to belong to trade unions, 66 per cent. thought that they had too much power and 50 per cent. thought they were controlled by extremists. That is a large slice of trade unionists.
My constituent is probably being pessimistic about the present situation, and I hope that that proves to be the case. I believe that the right way to see that extremists are not over-powerful is to ensure that all who work in a firm are involved to an increasing extent in

decision-making. If unions are allowed to conduct their elections and to have their meetings in company time and the management makes every effort to educate personnel, these problems will go away, but this will require a great deal of hard work.
If this happens, perhaps at the end of the day we shall arrive at the desirable situation where politics is left to the politician, management is left to management and decision-making is left to those who are involved in the enterprise in the formulation of which trade unionists will rightly have an expanding rôle. Until that time, I believe that this amendment will be necessary.

Mr. Prior: I wish briefly to reply to the debate.
My hon. Friend the Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) did not need to apologise for having been absent at the beginning of the debate. If other hon. Members had attended these debates as regularly as has my hon. Friend, we should have had a much fuller Chamber. Over a long time my hon. Friend has shown a constructive and understanding attitude about what happens on the shop floor. He was entitled to make out the case of his constituent.
We have had some interesting and powerful speeches from the Conservative Benches. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) takes a great interest in this subject, as does my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke). I know that my hon. Friend has great difficulties in his constituency with the 35 or 40 members of the ESU who wish to join a union which is subject to a union agreement but which is not the union to which they previously belonged.
I do not believe that these problems will just go away. I have been trying to make the Government understand—and also to bring my party to such a position—that since we admit that we went too far in one direction, the Government in turn should admit that they are now going too far in the other. No doubt we shall see other examples in the coming months of the kind of case mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Madel) and others mentioned other problems. I repeat that those problems will not just go away. There will always be a number of people with deeply held convictions that they should not belong to a particular specified union. The hon. Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie (Mr. Dempsey) said that there was a closed shop in his union which some people did not wish to join. They had paid their union dues to a charity, everybody was happy about the situation, and they had forgotten about it. That is the right way to work out these things. It is far better in many industrial units to have collective union agreements, but there must always be proper provision for the individual who refuses to join a union on grounds of conscience or deeply-held conviction.
9.15 p.m.
Surely this is our job. However, it is not only our task to protect the individual; we must also create an atmosphere for industrial peace. The Opposition and the Liberals have gone a long way to reach a sensible position. I believe that that is recognised by the trade union movement and the TUC leaders. The Government are in grave danger of creating for themselves the sort of problems we created for ourselves on a previous occasion.
That is why I have been seeking as far as is humanly possible to reach a position in our debates in which politicians can stand aside and leave industrial relations alone. I regret that we are again embarking on a branch of the law that will not enable peace to be created. The Minister said that he did not wish to encourage complaints to take cases of unfair dismissal to industrial tribunals, because in only two cases out of 40 in recent months had they been successful. Whether it is two people out of 40 or 20 people out of 400, they should have this right. If we do not give it to them, we shall still have problems. That is why we feel so strongly about this issue.
If hon. Member opposite had read the debates in the House of Lords, they would see that eminent people like Lord Houghton and Lord George-Brown had said that in modern times it should surely be possible for trade unions, in their overwhelmingly strong position, to accept

that there will always be a few people who will take a different view. Do they need this overweening power? The hon. Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie did not think so. Nor do we. That is why we shall vote for our amendment and hope that the Government will have second thoughts about rejecting it.

Mr. Booth: The Opposition are asking the House to perpetuate the situation in which the Ferrybridge Six case arose. That is what would happen if the amendment were passed. The test by which an industrial tribunal considered the unfair dismissal claim by the Ferrybridge Six would remain for tribunals to consider in similar circumstances. It is highly undesirable that this test should continue to be the one applied by tribunals to this type of unfair dismissal case. The test is whether an individual is reasonable in his objections to refusing to belong to a particular trade union.
It would be wrong of me to comment too closely upon the way in which the tribunal will examine a claim such as that of the Ferrybridge Six on these grounds. The claim of the ESU to have the right to represent its members in the electricity supply industry was considered by the National Industrial Relations Court. It came to a clear conclusion on whether it was an appropriate union to represent its members in that industry.
When the ESU applied in 1972 for bargaining rights for Ferrybridge, the court rejected its claim almost without hesitation and approved the existing bargaining machinery as adequately covering the Ferrybridge workers. The chairman of the court said:
There is no evidence that the ESU has the resources in experience or finance which a union needs if it is to sustain an effective role.
At that time the union had a membership of 7,000. Today it has only a few hundred members. A claim for bargaining rights would not fall to be made under the provisions of the Employment Protection Act after 1st February when the appropriate commencement order takes place.
While it was proper to debate the Opposition's grave objections to various aspects of the closed shop, that should not influence the issue on this amendment. Here we are concerned with


whether we want to continue in our law a provision which exists in circumstances which have given rise to the case of the Ferrybridge Six.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 240, Noes 287.

Division No. 39.]
AYES
[9.22 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Gorst, John
Mills, Peter


Aitken, Jonathan
Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Miscampbell, Norman


Alison, Michael
Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
Moate, Roger


Arnold, Tom
Gray, Hamish
Monro, Hector


Atkins, Rt Hon H. (Spelthorne)
Griffiths, Eldon
Montgomery, Fergus


Baker, Kenneth
Grist, Ian
Moore, John (Croydon C)


Banks, Robert
Grylls, Michael
More, Jasper (Ludlow)


Bell, Ronald
Hall, Sir John
Morgan, Geraint


Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)


Benyon, W.
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)


Biffen, John
Hampson, Dr Keith
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)


Biggs-Davison, John
Hannam, John
Mudd, David


Body, Richard
Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Neave, Airey


Boscawen, Hon Robert
Hastings, Stephen
Nelson, Anthony


Bottomley, Peter
Havers, Sir Michael
Neubert, Michael


Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Hawkins, Paul
Newton, Tony


Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)
Hayhoe, Barney
Normanton, Tom


Brittan, Leon
Hicks, Robert
Nott, John


Brocklebank-Fowler, C.
Higgins, Terence L.
Onslow, Cranley


Brotherton, Michael
Holland, Philip
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Hooson, Emlyn
Osborn, John


Bryan, Sir Paul
Hordern, Peter
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)


Buchanan-Smith, Alick
Howell, David (Guildford)
Parkinson, Cecil


Budgen, Nick
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Pattie, Geoffrey


Bulmer, Esmond
Hurd, Douglas
Penhaligon, David


Burden, F. A.
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Percival Ian


Carlisle Mark
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Pink, R. Bonner


Churchill, W. S.
James, David
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Prior, Rt Hon James


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Rathbone, Tim


Clegg, Walter
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Cockcroft, John
Jopling, Michael
Rees, Peter (Dover &amp; Deal)


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Cope, John
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Renton Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Cormack, Patrick
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)


Corrie, John
Kershaw, Anthony
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Costain, A. P.
Kilfedder, James
Ridley, Hon Nicholas


Crouch, David
Kimball, Marcus
Ridsdale, Julian


Crowder, F. P.
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)
Rifkind, Malcolm


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Dean, Paul (N Somerset)
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Knight, Mrs Jill
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Knox, David
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Drayson, Burnaby
Lamont, Norman
Rose, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


du Cann Rt Hon Edward
Lane, David
Royle, Sir Anthony


Durant, Tony
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Sainsbury, Tim


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Latham, Michael (Melton)
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Lawrence, Ivan
Shelton, William (Streatham)


Elliott, Sir William
Lawson, Nigel
Shepherd, Colin


Emery Peter
Le Marchant, Spencer
Shersby, Michael


Eyre, Reginald
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Silvester, Fred


Fairbairn, Nicholas
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Sims, Roger


Fairgrieve, Russell
Lloyd, Ian
Sinclair, Sir George


Fell, Anthony
Loveridge, John
Skeet, T. H. H.


Finsberg, Geoffrey
Luce, Richard
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Fisher, Sir Nigel
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
McCrindle, Robert
Speed, Keith


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Macfarlane, Neil
Spence, John


Fookes, Miss Janet
MacGregor, John
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)


Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Farnham)
Sproat, Iain


Fox Marcus
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)
Stainton, Keith


Freud, Clement
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)
Stanbrook, Ivor


Fry, Peter
Madel, David
Stanley, John


Galbraith, Hon T. G. D.
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Gardiner, George (Reigate)
Marten, Neil
Stokes, John


Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)
Maude, Angus
Stradling Thomas, J.


Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Glyn Dr Alan

Tebbit, Norman


Godber, Rt Hon Joseph
Mawby, Ray
Temple-Morris, Peter


Goodhart, Philip
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Thomas, Rt Hon P. (Hendon S)


Goodhew, Victor
Mayhew, Patrick
Townsend, Cyril D.


Goodlad, Alastair
Meyer, Sir Anthony
Trotter, Neville




Tugendhat, Christopher
Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)


van Straubenzee, W. R.
Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek
Younger, Hon George


Vaughan, Dr Gerard
Wall, Patrick



Viggers, Peter
Weatherill, Bernard
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)
Wiggin, Jerry
Mr. Anthony Berry and


Wakeham, John
Winterton, Nicholas
Mr. Carol Mather.


Walder, David (Clitheroe)
Wood, Rt Hon Richard





NOES


Allaun, Frank
Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)


Anderson, Donald
Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
Litterick, Tom


Archer, Peter
English, Michael
Loyden, Eddie


Armstrong, Ernest
Ennals, David
Luard, Evan


Ashley, Jack
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Lyon, Alexander (York)


Ashton, Joe
Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)


Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
McCartney, Hugh


Atkinson, Norman
Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
MacCormick, Iain


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
McCusker, H.


Bain, Mrs Margaret
Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
McElhone, Frank


Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
MacFarquhar, Roderick


Bates, Alf
Flannery, Martin
McGuire, Michael (Ince)


Bean, R. E.
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Mackenzie, Gregor


Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Maclennan, Robert


Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Ford, Ben
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)


Bidwell, Sydney
Forrester, John
McNamara, Kevin


Bishop, E. S.
Fowler Gerald (The Wrekin)
Madden, Max


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Freeson, Reginald
Magee, Bryan


Boardman, H.
Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Mahon, Simon


Booth, Albert
Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Mallalieu, J. P. W.


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
George, Bruce
Marks, Kenneth


Boyden, James (Bish Auck)
Gilbert, Dr John
Marquand, David


Bradley, Tom
Ginsburg, David
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Golding, John
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)


Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)
Gould, Bryan
Mason, Rt Hon Roy


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Gourlay, Harry
Meacher, Michael


Buchan, Norman
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert


Buchanan, Richard
Grant, John (Islington C)
Mikardo, Ian


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
Grocott, Bruce
Millan, Bruce


Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)


Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)


Campbell, Ian
Harper, Joseph
Mitchell, R. C. (Soton, Itchen)


Canavan, Dennis
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Molloy, William


Cant, R. B.
Hart, Rt Hon Judith
Molyneaux, James


Carmichael, Neil
Hatton, Frank
Moonman, Eric


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Hayman, Mrs Helene
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)


Cartwright, John
Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Castle, Rt Hon Barbara
Heffer, Eric S.
Moyle, Roland


Clemitson, Ivor
Henderson, Douglas
Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Hooley, Frank
Murray, Rt Mon Ronald King


Coleman, Donald
Horam, John
Newens, Stanley


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
Noble, Mike


Concannon, J. D.
Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
Oakes Gordon


Conlan, Bernard
Huckfield, Les
Ogden, Eric


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)
O'Halloran, Michael




O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian


Corbett, Robin
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Orbach, Maurice


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley


Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Ovenden, John


Crawford, Douglas
Hunter, Adam
Owen, Dr David


Cronin, John
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Padley, Walter


Crosland, Rt Hon Anthony
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)
Paisley, Rev Ian


Cryer, Bob
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)
Palmer, Arthur


Cunningham, G. (Islington S)
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
Park, George


Cunningham, D. J. (Whiten)
Janner, Greville
Parker, John


Dalyell, Tam
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Parry, Robert


Davidson, Arthur
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Pendry, Tom


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
John, Brynmor
Perry, Ernest


Davies, Denzil (Llanelli)
Johnson, James (Hull West)
Powell, Rt Hon J. Enoch


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)
Prescott, John


Deakins, Eric
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Price, C. (Lewisham W)


Dean, Joseph (Leeds W)
Jones, Barry (East Flint)
Price, William (Rugby)


Delargy, Hugh
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Radice, Giles


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Judd, Frank
Reid, George


Dempsey, James
Kaufman, Gerald
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Doig, Peter
Kelley, Richard
Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)


Dormand, J. D.
Kerr, Russell
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Roderick, Caerwyn


Duffy, A. E. P.
Kinnock, Neil
Rodgers, George (Chorley)


Dunlop, John
Lambie, David
Rodgers, William (Stockton)


Dunn, James A.
Lamborn, Harry
Rooker, J. W.


Dunnett, Jack
Lamond, James
Rose, Paul B.


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Eadie, Alex
Leadbitter, Ted
Rowlands, Ted


Edge, Geoff
Lee, John
Sandelson, Neville


Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton &amp; Slough)
Sedgemore, Brian







Selby, Harry
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)
Welsh, Andrew


Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)
White, Frank R. (Bury)


Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)
Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)
White, James (Pollok)


Shore, Rt Hon Peter
Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
Whitlock, William


Short, Rt Hon E. (Newcastle C)
Thompson, George
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Short, Mrs Renée (Wolv NE)
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)
Williams, Alan (Swansea W)


Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)
Tierney, Sydney
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Sillars, James
Tinn, James
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Silverman, Julius
Tomlinson, John
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Skinner, Dennis
Tomney, Frank
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)


Small, William
Torney, Tom
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)


Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)
Tuck, Raphael
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Snape, Peter
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Spearing, Nigel
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)
Woodall, Alec


Spriggs, Leslie
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)
Woof, Robert


Stallard, A. W.
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Wrigglesworth, Ian


Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)
Young, David (Bolton E)


Stott, Roger
Ward, Michael



Strang, Gavin
Watkins, David
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Strauss, Rt Hon G. R.
Watt, Hamish
Mr. David Stoddart and


Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley
Weetch, Ken
Mr. Laurie Pavitt.


Swain, Thomas
Wellbeloved, James

Question accordingly negatived.

Mr. Percival: I beg to move,
That, pursuant to the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949, the House suggests to the Lords the following Amendment to the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill:
Clause 2, page 2, line 7, leave out subsection (2).
Here we are dealing with whether a certain person should in certain circumstances be relieved of the normal provisions of the law.
It is often said that in the view of the Opposition the unions say that they should be above the law. However, we do not say that. We recognise—and we paid tribute to them again last week—that on the whole unions do not seek that position. But there are some respects in which the Government at least seek to put them in that position, whether or not they want it.
There are many circumstances in which a person who suffers injury because of the act of another is entitled to claim damages from that other person. Here we are dealing with whether certain people in certain circumstances should be relieved of that obligation, which rests upon all the other members of the community.
As the Secretary of State knows, my basic proposition is that the law should be the same for everyone and that if anyone says that it should be different for certain people, the onus is upon that person to justify it. If the Government say that certain people should be under certain obligations, it is for the Government to justify that. If, at the same time, people say that they should be free of certain obligations, it is for them to

justify that. The right hon. Gentleman, with his customary candour, will be the first to concede that we are dealing with that second position—in other words, with who should have immunity.
In our amendment we have sought to put the matter back as near as can be to the position which obtained before 1971. I say that because no one can ever put anything back precisely. Even on our proposals the immunity would be much wider than ever before because of the extension of the definition of "trade dispute". But, even allowing for that, we seek to put the matter back as near as can be to what it was before 1971. We accept that even with our amendment the immunity is considerably wider than it was then. We do not seek to avoid that consequence.
The difference between the position as it would be if the Government had their way and the position as it would be if we had this amendment is that if the amendment is not carried the immunity accorded to people in the situation that we are discussing would be very much wider than if the amendment were accepted. It would be very much wider because our amendment limits it to contracts of employment whereas the Government want to extend it to all kinds of contract. It would be very much wider because the Government want to include interference with contractual relations. It would be very much wider because the effect of the Government's proposals and subsection (3) is that even intimidation would be protected. There would be protection even in the case of the tort of intimidation.
That is the difference between us. We say that it is for the Government, or the unions if it is they who are asking for this, to establish the need to go even wider than would be the case in our amendment and to go as wide as the Government propose.
Let me deal with the arguments put forward earlier by the Government. The Government say that they are merely putting the situation back to what it was pre-1971. That is wrong. They say that all they are doing is correcting the interpretation which the judges placed on the law pre-1971. Again, that argument will not hold up. It seems to be supposed that this principle applies only to trade unions. It does not. It applies across the whole spectrum of the law.
Of the cases that have been decided following the case of Imperial Hotel v. Cousins, four of the five cases that immediately spring to mind have had nothing to do with trade unions. The Government and the trade unions must be careful not to fall into the error of saying that the decision was inconvenient, therefore it was wrong and therefore the judges are to be blamed and must be put right. This is what Professor Wedderburn always says. It is a dangerous approach to the law.
The Government's proposals are not necessary to clarify the law. Some of the clarification said to be necessary in the Donovan Report has already been effected by the courts. The Government cannot obtain any support for this from the Donovan Report. Although the Donovan Report said that the immunity should be extended to all kinds of contract, it also said that it was only to apply to registered unions and therefore to the officers of the unions acting in the course of their duty. Likewise, no support is to be gained for the Government's proposals from the Industrial Relations Act 1971.
I greatly regret having to rush this argument but there are two further points I must make. Why is this so important? It is important because we are talking about people who have been injured by the acts of someone else. This is only relevant to that basic hypothesis. These are not all big people able to look after themselves. Often they are trade unionists,

members of other unions. Often they are wholly innocent people who are minding their own business and who have become mixed up in a dispute and who may be absolutely ruined by the action of those who seek to rely on this immunity. It is important that we get the balance right.
I have a great admiration for the man who fights for his rights and who is prepared to pay for doing so. I do not have so much admiration for the person who tries to get his rights by causing harm to someone else. That is what happens in the case of secondary action. I do not deny the usefulness of this provision to a trade union wishing to further its claims. It is extraordinarily useful to have this immunity. The question is how much should be given at the expense of other members of the community who are equally entitled to look to the House for protection.
It is our case that our amendment would give wide immunity, quite sufficient to enable those who have a job to do to do it. We say that the Government go far beyond what is necessary and that it is for the Government to justify that extension. Unless and until they can do so, the House should resolutely refuse to approve what is proposed by the Government and should instead vote for the amendment.

9.45 p.m.

Mr. John Prescott: The hon. and learned Member for Southport (Mr. Percival) has tried to put the onus on us to justify special legal treatment. Many hon. Members could give different examples to justify the provision. I want to give one which is pertinent and specialised.
The main justification for the legislation is that it would give trade unions legal protection to extend the rights of workers and continue their struggle for improved benefits. The House must recognise that the British workers have been using their power, influence and strength not only for their own members, but for international workers. That is important in the context of international solidarity.
My example, which shows that it is necessary to have the subsection because it will protect the workers and allow them to advance the rights of trade union


members, concerns ships not belonging to traditional maritime countries but flying flags of convenience. Liberia, Panama and Cyprus are among those countries which have no traditional maritime interest and which offer tax avoidance, cheap labour and a lack of safety legislation.
The fleets flying flags of convenience have doubled in size every 10 years. By 1974 they constituted 25 per cent. of the world's shipping tonnage. They exploit labour from cheap sources in Africa and various other places. The seamen, with no one to protect them, are sailing on rotten hulks of ships similar to slave vessels and some face starvation. They are paid low wages and have very little heating. British workers have a responsibility for these men who have no organised strength with which to bargain.
The safety of the ships is also to be questioned. Liberia loses ships at three times the average rate of the OECD countries, Panama at six times the rate and Cyprus at eight times the rate. When these unsafe vessels go missing with complete crews, there is often no inquiry.
It may be argued that a problem like this should be solved by the international community, because the nation State concerned has failed to tackle the problem and many ships do not go back to that country. But very little is done internationally by Governments to improve the conditions of the seamen involved and most conventions are ignored. The action that has proved successful is that of trade unions showing their international solidarity.
The International Transport Federation, representing 80 countries and 320 organisations, met in London today to coordinate the campaign against flags-of-convenience ships. Such shipowners are forced to pay reasonable wages, to provide good conditions, to prevent the exploitation of thousands of seamen, and to observe reasonable and minimum standards. Over 800 ships have had such standards forced upon them—and "forced" is the word. We forced them to pay £200 a month as the average European wage when many were paying only £20 to £80 a month. The Federation has been able to force shipowners to pay £1½ million in back pay to the seamen this year. Trade union action

and intervention internationally on behalf of those workers requires the protection of the subsection.
The trade union movement internationally must be able to say to the shipowners that they will not allow a ship to leave port if its standards are not satisfactory. That is the justification for the subsection. We say to the dockers and the dock gate men "Do not allow this ship to leave port". In doing so we shall be in breach of the present legislation under which actions are protected only if they come under a contract of employment.
However, a commercial contract is involved here. Third parties are involved. If the seamen, the dock gate men or the dockers refuse to allow the ship to leave, they break the law and induce the breach of a commercial contract. That action is for tort under the present legislation. There is an example in today's Journal of Commerce. The owners of the Panamanian vessel "Camellia" have been forced to pay £50,000 to Pakistan seamen, who have been exploited at a wage of £80 a month. By joint ITF and NUS action in Lancaster we have forced the company to pay the average wage of £200 a month. That is just one further example of exploitation.
Nationally and internationally, Governments do not impose conditions on these ships. We act with international solidarity, but we break the law. This Manchester action itself must almost be breaking the law, but, clearly, no one pursues the law because greater problems are created by going through the courts.
Therefore, we need this provision. We hope that it will be passed tonight and that we shall continue to improve the wages and conditions not only of workers in this country, but internationally. We think that it is morally right to have these provisions. Indeed, if we are not given them by law, we shall continue to act in this way, because we think we are morally justified in improving the conditions of those workers unable to protect themselves.

Mr. Kenneth Lewis: I shall be brief. The speech we have just heard is the best argument against the Government's proposals that could have been made. The hon. Member


for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) has said that he and his union members have a right to have the law bent in such a way that they can interfere with international shipping by retaining ships in British ports.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. George Thomas): Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me for interrupting him, but I do not know whether he is aware that there is a desire to have a vote on this matter after the Government's reply. It cannot take place after 10 o'clock.

Mr. Lewis: I understand, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
It appears that strong-arm methods should be used to secure the hon. Gentleman's purpose. If this type of situation is accepted and pursued by his union in this country, what will happen if people abroad say the same thing, for other reasons, about British ships when they go into foreign ports? We are creating a situation which can reflect upon ourselves and upon the seamen employed on British ships whom the hon. Gentleman is trying to help.

Mr. Booth: The effect of the amendment would be to delete from the Bill the provision giving immunity against tort liability to actions in breach of any contract, or interference with the performance of a contract, in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute. I believe that the excellent and timely example given by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) of the reasons why some actions by the trade unions would inevitably bring about breaches of commercial contracts as well as contracts of employment might well be considered by the House.
If the amendment were carried, the immunity for trade unions engaged in industrial disputes or employers engaged in lock-outs would be limited to the immunity from breach of contract. Moreover, either could be liable to a tort on a breach of commercial contract. It is important that the law should be made clear on this point.
I have listened carefully, as always, to the hon. and learned Member for Southport (Mr. Percival). The view that he expressed tonight is totally at variance with that taken by the Donovan Commission. When examining this matter, the Donovan Commission came to the conclusion that there was a legal protection against a breach of commercial contract if one could thread through the very tortuous provisions of our law.
Donovan also took the view that in practice many would not know how to do this and could be caught on a tort for having breached a commercial contract. Therefore, Donovan came to the conclusion that the law should be changed to give immunity against breach of any contract. The Donovan Commission was divided and there was a minority view on whether the protection should exist only in the case of official strikes by registered unions.
The issue whether immunity against breach of contract should be limited only to the contract of employment was appropriate for consideration under Section 96 of the 1971 Act. That section provided that officials of registered trade unions concerned in official disputes were protected from breach of both the contract of employment and the commercial contract.
I accept that a case has to be made to show that there is inequity in maintaining the position in law where only the contract of employment is covered. That can be demonstrated by considering different disputes. For example, if the dispute described by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East were an official dispute carried out by a registered union it would inevitably bring about breaches of commercial contracts. Other disputes may be carried through without any fear of creating inequity in the law. Therefore, in some cases unions would have to undergo the risk of having a tort action brought against them if the amendment were carried, because that is the only way that certain disputes can be pursued.
We should reject the amendment to remove the inequitable position to which


I have referred and troublesome legal doubts. I ask the House to reject the amendment.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 241, Noes 288.

Division No. 40.]
AYES
[9.57 p.m.


Adley, Robert
Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Moore, John (Croydon C)


Aitken, Jonathan
Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
More, Jasper (Ludlow)


Alison, Michael
Gray, Hamish
Morgan, Geraint


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Griffiths, Eldon
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)


Arnold, Tom
Grist, Ian
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)


Atkins, Rt Hon H. (Spelthorne)
Grylls, Michael
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)


Baker, Kenneth
Hall, Sir John
Mudd, David


Banks, Robert
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Neave, Airey


Bell, Ronald
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Nelson, Anthony


Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Hampson, Dr Keith
Neubert, Michael


Benyon, W.
Hannam, John
Newton, Tony


Biffen, John
Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Nott, John


Biggs-Davison, John
Hastings, Stephen
Onslow, Cranley


Body, Richard
Havers, Sir Michael
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally


Boscawen, Hon Robert
Hawkins, Paul
Osborn, John


Bottomley, Peter
Hayhoe, Barney
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)


Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Hicks, Robert
Parkinson, Cecil


Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)
Higgins, Terence L.
Pattie, Geoffrey


Braine, Sir Bernard
Holland, Philip
Penhaligon, David


Brittan, Leon
Hooson, Emlyn
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Brocklebank-Fowler, C.
Hordern, Peter
Pink, R. Bonner


Brotherton, Michael
Howell, David (Guildford)
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Prior, Rt Hon James


Bryan, Sir Paul
Hurd, Douglas
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Buchanan-Smith, Alick
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Rathbone, Tim


Budgen, Nick
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Bulmer, Esmond
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Rees, Peter (Dover &amp; Deal)


Burden F. A.
James, David
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Carlisle, Mark
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)


Churchill, W. S.
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Ridley, Hon Nicholas


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Jopling, Michael
Ridsdale, Julian


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Rifkind, Malcolm


Clegg, Walter
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Cope, John
Kershaw, Anthony
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Cormack, Patrick
Kilfedder, James
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Corrie, John
Kimball, Marcus
Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


Costain, A. P.
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)
Royle, Sir Anthony


Crouch David
King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Sainsbury, Tim


Crowder, F. P.
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
Knight, Mrs Jill
Shelton, William (Streatham)


Dean, Paul (N Somerset)
Knox, David
Shepherd, Colin


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Lamont, Norman
Shersby, Michael


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Lane, David
Silvester, Fred


Drayson, Burnaby
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Sims, Roger


du Cann, Rt Hon Edward
Latham, Michael (Melton)
Sinclair, Sir George


Durant, Tony
Lawrence, Ivan
Skeet, T. H. H.


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Lawson, Nigel
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Le Marchant, Spencer
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Speed, Keith


Elliott, Sir William
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Spence, John


Emery, Peter
Lloyd, Ian
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)


Eyre, Reginald
Loveridge, John
Sproat, Iain


Fairbairn, Nicholas
Luce, Richard
Stainton, Keith


Fairgrieve, Russell
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Stanbrook, Ivor


Fell, Anthony
McCrindle, Robert
Stanley, John


Finsberg, Geoffrey
Macfarlane, Neil
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Fisher, Sir Nigel
MacGregor, John
Stokes, John


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Farnham)
Stradling Thomas, J.


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Fookes, Miss Janet
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)
Tebbit, Norman


Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)
Madel, David
Temple-Morris, Peter


Fox, Marcus
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)
Thomas, Rt Hon P. (Hendon S)


Freud, Clement
Marten, Neil
Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy (N Devon)


Fry, Peter
Maude, Angus
Townsend, Cyril D.


Galbraith, Hon T. G. D.
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald
Trotter, Neville


Gardiner, George (Reigate)
Mawby, Ray
Tugendhat, Christopher


Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
Mayhew, Patrick
Vaughan, Dr Gerard


Glyn, Dr Alan
Meyer, Sir Anthony
Viggers, Peter


Godber, Rt Hon Joseph
Mills, Peter
Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)


Goodhart, Philip
Miscampbell, Norman
Wakeham, John


Goodhew, Victor
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Goodlad, Alastair
Moate, Roger
Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)


Gorst, John
Monro, Hector
Walker Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek


Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Montgomery, Fergus
Wall, Patrick




Weatherill, Bernard
Wood, Rt Hon Richard
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Wiggin, Jerry
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)
Mr. Carol Mather and


Winterton, Nicholas
Younger, Hon George
Mr. Anthony Berry.




NOES


Allaun, Frank
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
MacCormick, Iain


Anderson, Donald
Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
McCusker, H.


Archer, Peter
Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
McElhone, Frank


Armstrong, Ernest
Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
MacFarquhar, Roderick


Ashley, Jack
Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
McGuire, Michael (Ince)


Ashton, Joe
Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
Mackenzie, Gregor


Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
Maclennan, Robert


Atkinson, Norman
Flannery, Martin
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
McNamara, Kevin


Bain, Mrs Margaret
Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Madden, Max


Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)
Ford, Ben
Magee, Bryan


Bates, Alf
Forrester, John
Mahon, Simon


Bean, R. E.
Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Mallalieu, J. P. W.


Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Freeson, Reginald
Marks, Kenneth


Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Marquand, David


Bidwell, Sydney
Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)


Bishop, E. S.
George, Bruce
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Gilbert, Dr John
Mason, Rt Hon Roy


Boardman, H.
Ginsburg, David
Meacher, Michael


Booth, Albert
Golding, John
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Gould, Bryan
Mikardo, Ian


Boyden, James (Bish Auck)
Gourlay, Harry
Millan, Bruce


Bradley, Tom
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)


Bray, Dr Jeremy
Grant, John (Islington C)
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)


Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)
Grocott, Bruce
Mitchell, R. C. (Soton, Itchen)


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Molloy, William


Buchan, Norman
Harper, Joseph
Molyneaux, James


Buchanan, Richard
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Moonman, Eric


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
Hart, Rt Hon Judith
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)


Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)
Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)
Hatton, Frank
Moyle, Roland


Campbell, Ian
Hayman, Mrs Helene
Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick


Canavan, Dennis
Healey, Rt Hon Denis
Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King


Cant, R. B.
Heffer, Erie S.
Newens, Stanley


Carmichael, Neil
Henderson, Douglas
Noble, Mike


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Hooley, Frank
Oakes, Gordon


Cartwright, John
Horam, John
Ogden, Eric


Castle, Rt Hon Barbara
Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
O'Halloran, Michael


Clemitson, Ivor
Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Huckfield, Les
Orbach, Maurice


Coleman, Donald
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Ovenden, John


Concannon, J. D.
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Owen, Dr David


Conlan, Bernard
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Padley, Walter


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Hunter, Adam
Paisley, Rev Ian


Corbett, Robin
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Palmer, Arthur


Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)
Park, George


Crawford, Douglas
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)
Parker, John


Cronin, John
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
Parry, Robert


Crosland, Rt Hon Anthony
Janner, Greville
Pavitt, Laurie


Cryer, Bob
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Pendry, Tom


Cunningham, G. (Islington S)
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Perry, Ernest


Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiteh)
John, Brynmor
Powell, Rt Hon J. Enoch


Dalyell, Tam
Johnson, James (Hull West)
Prescott, John


Davidson, Arthur
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)
Price, C. (Lewisham W)


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Price, William (Rugby)


Davies, Denzil (Llanell[...])
Jones, Barry (East Flint)
Radice, Giles


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Reid, George


Deakins, Eric
Judd, Frank
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Dean, Joseph (Leeds W)
Kaufman, Gerald
Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)


Delargy, Hugh
Kelley, Richard
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Kerr, Russell
Roderick, Caerwyn


Dempsey, James
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Rodgers, George (Chorley)


Doig, Peter
Kinnock, Neil
Rodgers, William (Stockton)


Dormand, J. D,
Lambie, David
Rooker, J. W.


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Lamborn, Harry
Rose, Paul B.


Duffy, A. E. P.
Lamond, James
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Dunlop, John
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)
Rowlands, Ted


Dunn, James A.
Leadbitter, Ted
Sandelson, Neville


Dunnett, Jack
Lee, John
Sedgemore, Brian


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton &amp; Slough)
Selby, Harry


Eadie, Alex
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)


Edge, Geoff
Litterick, Tom
Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)


Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
Loyden, Eddie
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Luard, Evan
Short, Rt Hon E. (Newcastle C)


Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
Lyon, Alexander (York)
Short, Mrs Renée (Wolv NE)


English, Michael
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)
Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)


Ennals, David
McCartney, Hugh
Sillars, James







Silverman, Julius
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)
Whitlock, William


Skinner, Dennis
Tierney, Sydney
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Small, William
Tinn, James
Williams, Alan (Swansea W)


Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)
Tomlinson, John
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Snape, Peter
Tomney, Frank
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Spearing, Nigel
Torney, Tom
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Spriggs, Leslie
Tuck, Raphael
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)


Stallard, A. W.
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)


Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Stoddart, David
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Stott, Roger
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Woodall, Alec


Strang, Gavin
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)
Woof, Robert


Strauss, Rt Hon G. R.
Ward, Michael
Wrigglesworth, Ian


Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley
Watkins, David
Young, David (Bolton E)


Swain, Thomas
Watt, Hamish



Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)
Weetch, Ken
TELLERS FOR THE NOES


Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)
Wellbeloved, James
Mr. James Hamilton and


Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)
Welsh, Andrew
Mr. Thomas Cox.


Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
White, Frank R. (Bury)



Thompson, George
White, James (Pollok)

Question accordingly negatived.


Ordered,


That the Third Reading of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Bill may be proceeded with at this day's sitting, though opposed, until Twelve o'clock.—[Mr. Pendry.]

Orders of the Day — TRADE UNION AND LABOUR RELATIONS (AMENDMENT) BILL

Order for Third Reading read.

10.11 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Michael Foot): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I hope that in moving the Third Reading I shall be brief. I am sure that everyone will wish that to be the course to be pursued. I hope all hon. Members will agree that, despite suggestions some weeks ago that this procedure would curtail proper discussion, we have provided sufficient time for reconsideration of the Bill. I think that the only hon. Member who has suffered under our procedure—and I apologise to him at once—is the hon. Member for Woolwich, West (Mr. Bottomley), whose amendments were not able to be called under the procedure we have followed.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I do not wish to go back to the occasion when some of us predicted that this would happen, especially as I was not in the House for the previous rounds. However, I ask the right hon. Gentleman to indicate whether my amendments would have been acceptable. I know that there is not time to go into the reasons for or against them.

Mr. Foot: I was about to say that, persuasive as I am sure the hon. Gentleman's speeches would have been, we would not have been able to accept his amendments. His first amendment concerned the political levy. If he looks at the existing rules of trade unions, he will see that most of the difficulties that he might think might arise are already covered. The other matters that he raised are already covered, we believe, by the provisions that enable agreements to be made between employers and unions. We think that that is the best way of dealing with the problems that the hon. Member had in mind. I cannot give him any further satisfaction than that. We hoped that he would be able to move his amendments in the proper way. There was no desire by the Government to seek to exclude him from doing so.
I think most hon. Members will agree that, contrary to the suggestions that the Government were being miserly or trying to curtail the time that the House would have to discuss these matters, we have had very full time for reconsideration of the Bill. I had in mind to state very briefly the sort of procedure that might occur, following Third Reading, in another place, but even those remarks I shall abbreviate very much further than I had previously thought.
The Bill will now go to another place once we give it a Third Reading. I trust that it will be given a Third Reading with a substantial majority such as we have been enjoying throughout the day.
When the Bill goes to another place, I hope that those concerned will recognise the view which has been expressed in such overwhelming terms by this House. I hope they will take that into account and allow the Bill to go on to the statute book speedily and without the Parliament Act needing to be invoked. That would be the simplest and most sensible course. Arrangements could be made whereby the main additional suggestion, as it is called under this procedure, which has been approved in these discussions could be added to the Bill as it was left on the previous occasion. The Press charter can be added to the propositions by the House of Lords, and it will be discussed by the methods which the Government will describe in the House of Lords.
I hope that the other place will take account of the fact that we have had substantial majorities on all the other matters that have come before us on this Bill but that this particular proposition passed this House without a dissenting voice. Since there have been these substantial majorities on a measure which is controversial, I trust that the other place will now recognise the will of the elected House of Commons and accept that fact.
I say in conclusion that many violent adjectives or nouns have been used in this debate. Indeed, I have been referred to as Dr. Faustus. It was remarked of Dr. Faustus,
Let Faustus live in hell a thousand years".
I dare say that some people would choose that fate for me. But surely even


Dr. Faustus would have been able to knock something off that thousand years if he had been able to plead that he had spent a thousand hours on the Trade Union and Labour Relations Bill. Therefore, I ask for a remission for all those who have endured the same fate.
We believe that this measure will contribute to industrial relations and we send the Bill to the other place in that spirit. We trust that the other place will never dare to send it back again.

10.18 p.m.

Mr. James Prior: I wondered what the Secretary of State for Employment was reading so avidly during the debate. I thought that he was bored with the proceedings. I now recognise that he must have been wading through "Dr. Faustus" to find the quotation he gave.
We have regarded this Bill and its predecessor which was thrown out by the House of Lords as being particularly bad. It is a little disingenuous of the Secretary of State to say that the Press charter passed without dissent in this House. The truth is that we had long debates on the matter and went deeply into the subject of the charter. We were unsuccessful, and I suppose that the charter can be regarded as at least a step in the right direction. We believe that it will have to be greatly strengthened in a year or two and we hope that we shall then have the support of Labour Members.
The Bill has been concerned the whole way through with the issue of the freedom of the individual. Its provisions involve the exclusion or expulsion of an individual from a trade union without a properly constituted tribunal or court before which a case can be put. It also touches conscience grounds in respect of unfair dismissal when a man does not wish to belong to a trade union. We were unable even to write in the words

"deeply-held conviction." Such words have been barred from the Bill.

I see no members of the Scottish National Party present, and on no single occasion have they supported us during the passage of the Bill. So much for their ideas of freedom north of the border.

The Bill has received larger majorities than it deserved. That is certainly true when judged against the attendance during our debates of Labour Members, who have been conspicuous by their absence.

We are grateful to the Government for having given the House two days' discussion of the measure. We think that the procedure has worked reasonably well. Of course, it may have to work again on subsequent occasions. If the Government go on producing legislation like this, I would not be at all surprised if we have more of this procedure.

We believe that a sensible middle course could have been adopted between our amendments and the Government's desire to have no proper guarantees in the Bill for the rights of the individual. If we had reached an agreed solution, it would have done more to help industrial relations than any other single thing we shall do in the lifetime of this Parliament. A great opportunity has been missed.

We shall consult the TUC and seek to reach agreement—and I believe that we can—on many of the aspects concerned with the rights of the individual which the TUC leaders and their members understand, even if the Government do not. It is in that spirit that we shall approach future industrial relations. For the moment, we shall leave their Lordships to do what they like with the Bill.

Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time:—

The House divided: Ayes, 285, Noes 249.

Division No. 41.]
AYES
[10.22 p.m.


Allaun, Frank
Bean, R. E.
Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)


Anderson, Donald
Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)


Archer, Peter
Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)
Buchan, Norman


Armstrong, Ernest
Bidwell, Sydney
Buchanan, Richard


Ashley, Jack
Bishop, E. S.
Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)


Ashton, Joe
Blenkinsop, Arthur
Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)


Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)
Boardman, H.
Callaghan, Jim (Middleton &amp; P)


Atkinson, Norman
Booth, Albert
Campbell, Ian


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Canavan, Dennis


Bain, Mrs Margaret
Boyden, James (Bish Auck)
Cant, R. B.


Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)
Bradley, Tom
Carmichael, Neil


Bates, Alf
Bray, Dr Jeremy
Carter-Jones, Lewis




Cartwright, John
Huckfield, Les
Park, George


Castle, Rt Hon Barbara
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)
Parker, John


Clemitson, Ivor
Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Parry, Robert


Cocks, Michael (Bristol S)
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Pavitt, Laurie


Coleman, Donald
Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Perry, Ernest


Colquhoun, Mrs Maureen
Hunter, Adam
Prescott, John


Concannon, J. D.
Irvine, Rt Hon Sir A. (Edge Hill)
Price, C. (Lewisham W)


Conlan, Bernard
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)
Price, William (Rugby)


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)
Radice, Giles


Corbett, Robin
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
Janner, Greville
Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)


Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)
Jeger, Mrs Lena
Robertson, John (Paisley)


Crawford, Douglas
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Roderick, Caerwyn


Cronin, John
John, Brynmor
Rodgers, George (Chorley)


Crosland, Rt Hon Anthony
Johnson, James (Hull West)
Rodgers, William (Stockton)


Cryer, Bob
Johnson, Walter (Derby S)
Rooker, J. W.


Cunningham, G. (Islington S)
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Rose, Paul B.


Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiten)
Jones, Barry (East Flint)
Rowlands, Ted


Dalyell, Tam
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Sandelson, Neville


Davidson, Arthur
Judd, Frank
Sedgemore, Brian


Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)
Kaufman, Gerald
Selby, Harry


Davies, Denzil (Llanelli)
Kelley, Richard
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)


Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Kerr, Russell
Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)


Deakins, Eric
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Shore, Rt Hon Peter


Dean Joseph (Leeds West)
Kinnock, Neil
Short, Rt Hon E. (Newcastle C)


Delargy, Hugh
Lambie, David
Short, Mrs Renée (Wolv NE)


Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Lamborn, Harry
Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)


Dempsey, James
Lamond, James
Sillars, James


Doig, Peter
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)
Silverman, Julius


Dormand, J. D.
Leadbitter, Ted
Skinner, Dennis


Douglas-Mann, Bruce
Lee, John
Small, William


Duffy, A. E. P.
Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton &amp; Slough)
Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)


Dunn, James A.
Lever, Rt Hon Harold
Snape, Peter


Dunnett, Jack
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Spearing, Nigel


Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth
Litterick, Tom
Spriggs, Leslie


Eadie, Alex
Loyden, Eddie
Stallard, A. W.


Edge, Geoff
Luard, Evan
Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)


Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)
Lyon, Alexander (York)
Stott, Roger


Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)
Strang, Gavin


Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
McCartney, Hugh
Strauss, Rt Hon G. R.


English, Michael
MacCormick, Iain
Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley


Ennals, David
McElhone, Frank
Swain, Thomas


Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
MacFarquhar, Roderick
Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)


Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
McGuire, Michael (Ince)
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)


Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)
Mackenzie, Gregor
Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)


Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Mackintosh, John P.
Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)


Ewing, Mrs Winifred (Moray)
Maclennan, Robert
Thompson, George


Fernyhough, Rt Hn E.
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)
Thorne, Stan (Preston South)


Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
McNamara, Kevin
Tierney, Sydney


Flannery, Martin
Madden, Max
Tinn, James


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Magee, Bryan
Tomlinson, John


Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Mahon, Simon
Tomney, Frank


Ford, Ben
Mallalieu, J. P. W.
Torney, Tom


Forrester, John
Marks, Kenneth
Tuck, Raphael


Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Marquand, David
Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.


Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)


Freeson, Reginald
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)
Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)


Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Mason, Rt Hon Roy
Walker, Harold (Doncaster)




Walker, Terry (Kingswood)


Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Meacher, Michael
Ward, Michael


George, Bruce
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert
Watkins, David


Gilbert, Dr John
Mikardo, Ian
Watt, Hamish


Ginsburg, David
Millan, Bruce
Weetch, Ken


Golding, John
Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)
Wellbeloved, James


Gould, Bryan
Miller, Mrs Millie (Ilford N)
Welsh, Andrew


Gourlay, Harry
Mitchell, R. C. (Soton, Itchen)
White, Frank R. (Bury)


Graham, Ted
Molloy, William
White, James (Pollok)


Grant, George (Morpeth)
Moonman, Eric
Whitlock, William


Grant, John (Islington C)
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Grocott, Bruce
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Williams, Alan (Swansea W)


Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Moyle, Roland
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Harper, Joseph
Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King
Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)


Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Newens, Stanley
Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)


Hart, Rt Hon Judith
Noble, Mike
Wilson, Rt Hon H. (Huyton)


Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Oakes, Gordon
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Hatton, Frank
Ogden, Eric
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Hayman, Mrs Helene
O'Halloran, Michael
Woodall, Alec


Healey, Rt Hon Denis
O'Malley, Rt Hon Brian
Woof, Robert


Henderson, Douglas
Orbach, Maurice
Wrigglesworth, Ian


Heffer, Eric S.
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Young, David (Bolton E)


Hooley, Frank
Ovenden, John



Horam, John
Owen, Dr David
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H)
Padley, Walter
Mr. Tom Pendry and


Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)
Palmer, Arthur
Mr. David Stoddart.







NOES


Adley, Robert
Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
More, Jasper (Ludlow)


Aitken, Jonathan
Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
Morgan, Geraint


Alison, Michael
Gray, Hamish
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)


Amery, Rt Hon Julian
Griffiths, Eldon
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)


Arnold, Tom
Grist, Ian
Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)


Atkins, Rt Hon H, (Spelthorne)
Grylls, Michael
Mudd, David


Awdry, Daniel
Hall, Sir John
Neave, Airey


Baker, Kenneth
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Nelson, Anthony


Banks, Robert
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Neubert, Michael


Beith, A. J.
Hampson, Dr Keith
Newton, Tony


Bell, Ronald
Hannam, John
Normanton, Tom


Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)
Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Nott, John


Benyon, W.
Hastings, Stephen
Onslow, Cranley


Berry, Hon Anthony
Havers, Sir Michael
Oppenheim, Mrs Sally


Biffen, John
Hawkins, Paul
Osborn, John


Biggs-Davison, John
Hayhoe, Barney
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)


Blaker, Peter
Hicks, Robert
Paisley, Rev Ian


Body, Richard
Higgins, Terence L.
Parkinson, Cecil


Boscawen, Hon Robert
Holland, Philip
Pattie, Geoffrey


Bottomley, Peter
Hooson, Emlyn
Penhaligon, David


Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Hordern, Peter
Percival, Ian


Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)
Howell, David (Guildford)
Peyton, Rt Hon John


Braine, Sir Bernard
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)
Pink, R. Bonner


Brittan, Leon
Hurd, Douglas
Powell, Rt Hon J. Enoch


Brocklebank-Fowler, C.
Hutchison, Michael Clark
Price, David (Eastleigh)


Brotherton, Michael
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Prior, Rt Hon James


Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Pym, Rt Hon Francis


Bryan, Sir Paul
James, David
Rathbone, Tim


Buchanan-Smith, Alick
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)
Rawlinson, Rt Hon Sir Peter


Budgen, Nick
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Rees, Peter (Dover &amp; Deal)


Bulmer, Esmond
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Rees-Davies, W. R.


Burden, F. A.
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)
Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)


Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Jopling, Michael
Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)


Carlisle, Mark
Joseph, Rt Hon Sir Keith
Ridley, Hon Nicholas


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Ridsdale, Julian


Churchill, W. S.
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine
Rifkind, Malcolm


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Kershaw, Anthony
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)


Clark, William (Croydon S)
Kilfedder, James
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Kimball, Marcus
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Clegg, Walter
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)
Ross, William (Londonderry)


Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)
King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)


Cope, John
Kitson, Sir Timothy
Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)


Cormack, Patrick
Knight, Mrs Jill
Royle, Sir Anthony


Corrie, John
Knox, David
Sainsbury, Tim


Costain, A. P.
Lament, Norman
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)


Crouch, David
Lane, David
Shelton, William (Streatham)


Crowder. F. P.
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Shepherd, Colin


Davies, Rt Hon J. (Knutsford)
Latham, Michael (Melton)
Shersby, Michael


Dodsworth, Geoffrey
Lawrence, Ivan
Sims, Roger


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Lawson, Nigel
Sinclair, Sir George


Drayson, Burnaby
Le Marchant, Spencer
Skeet, T. H. H.


du Cann, Rt Hon Edward
Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Dunlop, John
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Durant, Tony
Lloyd, Ian
Speed, Keith


Eden, Rt Hon Sir John
Loveridge, John
Spence, John


Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Luce, Richard
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)


Elliott, Sir William
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Sproat, Iain


Emery, Peter
McCrindle, Robert
Stainton, Keith


Eyre, Reginald
McCusker, H.
Stanbrook, Ivor


Fairbairn, Nicholas
Macfarlane, Neil
Stanley, John


Fairgrieve, Russell
MacGregor, John
Steal, David (Roxburgh)


Fell, Anthony
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Farnham)
Stokes, John


Finsberg, Geoffrey
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)
Stradling Thomas, J.


Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Madel, David
Tebbit, Norman


Fookes, Miss Janet
Marshall, Michael (Arundel)
Temple-Morris, Peter


Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)
Marten, Neil
Thatcher, Rt Hon Margaret


Fox, Marcus
Maude, Angus
Thomas, Rt Hon P. (Hendon S)


Freud, Clement
Maudling, Rt Hon Reginald
Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy (N Devon)


Fry, Peter
Mawby, Ray
Townsend, Cyril D.


Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Trotter Neville


Gardiner, George (Reigate)
Mayhew, Patrick
Tugendhat, Christopher


Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)
Meyer, Sir Anthony
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)
Mills, Peter
Vaughan, Dr Gerard


Glyn, Dr Alan
Miscampbell, Norman
Viggers, Peter


Godber, Rt Hon Joseph
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Wakeham, John


Goodhart, Philip
Moate, Roger
Walder, David (Clitheroe)


Goodhew, Victor
Molyneaux, James
Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)


Goodlad, Alastair
Monro, Hector
Walker-Smith, Rt Hon Sir Derek


Gorst, John
Montgomery, Fergus
Wall, Patrick


Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Moore, John (Croydon C)
Weatherill, Bernard







Whitelaw, Rt Hon William
Wood, Rt Hon Richard
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Wiggin, Jerry
Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)
Mr. Carol Mather and


Winterton, Nicholas
Younger, Hon George
Mr. Fred Silvester.

Question accordingly agreed to.


Bill read the Third time and passed.


Ordered,


That the amendments suggested by this House to the Bill be communicated to the Lords.


CONSIDERATION ON REPORT OF CERTAIN BILLS BY A STANDING COMMITTEE


Ordered,


That Standing Order No. 73 (Consideration on report of certain Bills by a Standing Committee) be amended, as follows:—


Line 24, leave out 'and Monmouthshire'.


Line 27, leave out 'and Monmouthshire'.— [Mr. Coleman.]

Orders of the Day — ADJOURNMENT

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Coleman.]

HOUSING (LUTON)

10.34 p.m.

Mr. Brian Sedgemore: This may be one of the last occasions on which I shall address you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in your present capacity—at least, I hope so.
Like most other industrial towns, Luton has an acute housing crisis. Because it is a growth town and because the pressures from outside—as well as from inside—are tremendous, the crisis grows worse. Ten years ago there were 2,723 applicants on Luton's housing waiting list. In those 10 years 3,568 houses have been built by the council. Yet today there are 4,000 applicants on the waiting list. The tragedy is that every week of the year another 10 families are added to that waiting list. Every week some of those families come to my surgery, their despair matched only by my own.
Some of the young women who come to my surgery literally break down into tears when one tells them the awful truth—that they have no chance in the foreseeable future of a home for themselves or their families.
One of the main problems is not finance. It is land. The land situation in Luton is moving from the desperate to the catastrophic. The chief planner of Luton tells me—some will find it hard to believe—that between now and 1991 Luton is likely to need land for 30,000 dwellings. Even in theory there is enough land for only 6,000 dwellings. In practice there probably is not more than enough for 3,000 dwellings.
That means that, in the long run, development will have to take place outside Luton—to the south, at East Hyde, and into Hertfordshire. If development takes place outside Luton, I hope that it takes place in the immediate vicinity and not miles away in such places as Flitwick and North Bedfordshire.
All this is in the future. There is an immediate crisis. Some of those families

want relief, and want it in the near future. The Minister for Planning and Local Government can help us, and help us now, because he has before him an application by the Luton District Council to build homes for 300 families at Pastures Way, on Lewsey Farm, in Luton. It has come to the Minister as a departure from the development plan. The Luton District Council is supported by the Labour group on the County Council, by the Chairman of the County Council Planning Committee, Councillor Blowers, and—even more important—by the overwhelming majority of the people of Luton.
The only people against that development are the combustible squirearchy of Bedfordshire and a few local Liberals. The Minister should not worry very much about Bedfordshire's squirearchy. They do not care and they do not know. Their hopes, dreams and aspirations are light years away from the hopes, dreams and aspirations of the working people of Luton.
I do not think the Minister should worry too much about Luton's local Liberals who, in the words of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment—the hon. Member for Widnes (Mr. Oakes)—last night, have waged a "peevish, petty Poujadist" campaign against the homeless in Luton, not because they are interested in the environment or green belt but because they think there is a chance of winning votes in the elections in May.
They have played on the feelings of the people who live at Lewsey Farm, but they have received no support whatsoever. They cannot get anybody to come forward and object to the building of homes on this land, because the people on Lewsey Farm are decent people who are prepared to worry about the problems of others. They are not prepared to attack the homeless, and have not done so. They welcome the building of houses on this piece of land.
The only serious argument I have heard is that it would mean building on the green wedge which exists between Luton and Dunstable. I could understand that argument if Luton and Dunstable were a large conurbation from which it was difficult to reach the countryside, but it cannot


take anybody 10 minutes to get out to the countryside. Most of the people who live in that area can literally see the countryside from where they stand at any given moment.
Equally, this piece of land is not the sort of land that should be preserved for a green belt. It is nondescript and inaccessible to the public. No one could claim that there is over-development in this area. There is a sports complex and a school in Pastures Way in Luton. This is the sort of land which should be used for housing. I favour the green belt, but an artificial argument has been constructed around it in this case.
I leave the Minister with this thought from the leader of the Luton district council, Councillor Lines. He says that every time he drives past this bit of land on the motorway he can only smile at the thought that it is green belt land for the enjoyment of the people. I agree with him.
One of the outstanding actions of this Government has been to reintroduce local democracy into housing, and it is important. The people of Luton are grateful that it has been done It can have an effect on rents in Luton. The Government have been very generous in giving subsidies so that councils can hold their rent increases to 60p, but they have left councils the discretion to fix their rents even lower if they wish. I believe that the Labour council in Luton will fight for lower rents. I believe that rent increases will be half that, and possibly even less. If that happens, I hope that the Minister will say that that is what local democracy is about, that Luton's councillors have the right to do that, and that he will support them.
In this case, I think that we can get well below the 60p and be fair both to council tenants and to ratepayers. The chairman of the Finance Committee, Councillor Lewis, and the Chairman of the Housing Committee, Councillor Kennedy, have the skill and ingenuity to pick a figure which is fair to tenants and to ratepayers. But we need the support of the Minister in this kind of action.
I find it almost unbelievable that the Luton News, a non-political paper, in

a non-political article written only last week by the sister of a Liberal county councillor, Councillor Larkman, should print the following:
If there's one thing guaranteed to get my back up it's people who think the world, or more particularly their local council, owe them something.
Just think of council house tenants. Most of them are a darn sight better off than people who have the guts and independence to rent privately or buy property. Most council houses have central heating. Their tenants usually own at least one car. Many have a telly—probably colour—and go abroad annually for their holidays.
A three-bedroomed council house with central heating in Farley Hill costs £6·14 a week in rent, exclusive of rates. A similar house rented privately would be up to £30 a week.
Council housing is a great idea—for people who really can't afford to buy or rent their own place. But if tenants can afford luxuries like cars, expensive holidays and a telly they shouldn't be living a life of ease at the expense of more conscientious ratepayers. And how many couples are there living in three- or four-bedroomed houses, even though their families are grown up and have left the house.
Why don't the council introduce a policy of moving the couples into smaller flats when there is no need for them to have a house. And why don't young couples who move into a council house soon after their marriage make any effort to save up for a deposit on a house of their own? Surely, council property should be regarded as a stop-gap and not as an end in itself. So, you wealthy tenants—pull your fingers out, get off your backsides and help yourselves.
That is not a legitimate view based on fact. It is an illegitimate expression of prejudice and hate based on ignorance, and it echoes the views of precisely the kind of people who want to deny that land at Lewsey's Farm to the homeless. I say to the Minister, "Give us a decision. Give us a quick decision. Give us a firm decision."

10.43 p.m.

Mr. Ivor Clemitson: I support every word said by my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, West (Mr. Sedgemore). Incidentally, the houses on Farley Hill, mentioned in the newspaper article quoted by him, are in my constituency and are nearly 30 years old. It was the first post-war housing estate built in Luton.
No one would claim that Luton's housing problems are the worst in the country. That would be an absurd statement. But we have very serious problems. My own constituency covers the


central area of the town and most of the older areas, and there are still many houses which lack most of the basic amenities. They have outside toilets, no bathrooms and no hot water.
In the centre of Luton, we have a skyscraper hotel with 153 rooms. It grew miraculously from 40 rooms in the original plan, but we were told that a 40-room hotel was not on, so it grew to 153. But each of those 153 rooms has a bathroom. Almost within spitting distance of that hotel are many homes which are not fit for human habitation and which certainly have no bathrooms.
As my hon. Friend said, we have a great shortage of land for building in Luton, and I support him in his plea to the Minister that a decision be made to free for building houses the piece of land to which he referred in order to help partially to relieve this tremendous problem.
There are two general points I wish to raise. The Government want a shift of policy away from demolition towards rehabilitation. This is particularly significant in my constituency. The Luton District Council is doing everything it can to implement this policy but it faces the problem that the Department limit on money that can be used for the repair, maintenance and improvement of council houses is such that it is difficult to put this policy into effect. I quote briefly from a letter which the Chief Executive, Mr. Collins, addressed to my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, West. The letter says:
This council has welcomed this new policy of central Government, as it seems particularly fitted to the needs of Luton, but they fear that if sufficient money is not made available for repair and improvement to tackle a rehabilitation programme successfully, the outmoded policy of demolition will have to be adopted in many cases, because Luton faces a serious problem of ageing properties, both in the public and private sector.
The second, admittedly general, matter I wish to raise is the cost of providing council dwellings at the prevailing high interest rates. Again I quote from the letter. It says:
A very cogent local example of the problem is that it is estimated that each new dwelling which we provide in Luton will cost us at least 12,000, excluding the cost of providing the site and services to the site. In these circumstances, local authorities need not only a substantial subsidy from central Government, but

a very clear indication well in advance of the amount of subsidy which can be made available.
I do not claim that Luton's housing problems are the worst in the country or that they are unique. The points I have raised are not peculiar to Luton. I hope that the Minister will comment upon them.

10.47 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Ernest Armstrong): My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, West (Mr. Sedgemore) has raised an important matter. I am glad that he has the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, East (Mr. Clemitson). I will try to deal with the points that they have raised. They have both performed a service by raising these issues tonight. They are important to those for whom the Luton council wishes to provide new or better homes. These matters are certainly important for the ratepayers of Luton. Above all, they are important for the families who are in desperate need and who seek decent homes.
The debate gives me an opportunity, which does not arise often, to explain how the Government's housing policies affect a particular area and to show what help the Government can and do give to local authorities. Luton is a town where the population has increased very fast in recent years. This obviously presents great housing problems. Between 1961 and 1971 the population increased by one-seventh from about 140,000 to about 160,000. Since 1971 the population has continued to expand, though more slowly, and it is now around 166,000. Employment opportunities have been good, and this attraction, coupled with the national trend towards smaller households, has created a vigorous and urgent demand for housing. Although Luton is not a growth area in the Strategic Plan for the South-East, this demand can be expected to continue over the next few years because of migration into the area as well as the natural growth in the existing population.
There are about 4,000 people on Luton's waiting list for council housing, and the number is growing. I understand that the council expects between 500 and 600 houses a year to become available for re-letting. Its building programme shows a healthy increase, for which the


council deserves credit. From 195 houses completed in 1973 it expects to complete well over 300 this financial year, over 500 next year, and, subject to land availability—to which my hon. Friend referred—about 900 in 1977–78. In the first six months of 1975–76 it started over 450 houses, so it is well on target. There have, of course, been demolitions to set against these figures, but they show a considerable net housing gain and a healthy trend.
However, as my hon. Friend said, the borough council now has very little new land available for development for housing within the borough boundary. My Department is well aware of these difficulties. Once the Marsh Farm estate in the north of the town is complete, there is little undeveloped land that it can bring into use. There are, as anywhere, a number of small sites in the town that can usefully be developed. But, important though it is to make the fullest possible use of these, I appreciate that they are unlikely to go all that far towards meeting Luton's housing needs and that what is needed is room for expansion.
My hon. Friend referred to the borough's council's desire to build houses at Pastures Way, next to the Lewsey Farm estate on the north-west side of the town. At present this is an open strip of land between Luton and Houghton Regis, just inside the Luton boundary. Obviously this raises planning issues. The council's planning application was called in for a decision by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.
A public inquiry was held in October, at which Luton's housing needs were fully described by the borough council's representatives. They have been vigorously confirmed by my hon. Friends in tonight's debate. My hon. Friends will realise that as the case is still under consideration by my right hon. Friend I cannot comment on its merits, nor can I give a definite date when my right hon. Friend's decision will be announced, but we recognise the urgency of the matter, and there will be no unnecessary delay in coming to a decision.
If the borough council is so short of land within its boundary, it can only expand outside. That always presents difficulties of one kind or another. But it is a situation that has to be faced if

Luton is to carry out its obligation as a housing authority, and it should be considered in the context of the county structure plan. The plan is in the early stages of preparation, and I am sure that the question of Luton's housing needs is a matter that will be fully discussed between the county and the borough. I hope that they will be able to reach amicable agreement.
My hon. Friend also expressed concern about the freedom of housing authorities in deciding rent increases. He was wondering, I think, whether the Luton Borough Council would be penalised if it decided to increase the rents of its dwellings in 1976–77 by a figure lower than the average of 60p per week which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has made clear he expects to be the average increase in rents by local authorities.
The law is quite clear. Under the Housing Rents and Subsidies Act 1975, which we promoted, local authorities had restored to them the power, which the Conservatives took away from them, to make such reasonable charges as they might determine. We pledged in our manifesto in 1974 that local authorities should have restored to them the full responsibility for fixing the rents of their houses. We have carried out that pledge, and I emphasise that we have no intention of going back on it.
What we have tried to do is to give guidance to local authorities on how they might balance that freedom with their responsibility to their ratepayers, at a time of severe inflation in costs, and when no one wants to add to inflationary pressures by exceptional increases in either rents or rates. That was the point of my right hon. Friend's guidance on the 60p. That was estimated to be the national average amount of an increase in line with the rise of prices generally.
My hon. Friend rightly asked whether Luton would suffer financially if, nevertheless, it decided to increase rents by a lower amount than 60p on average. It is difficult to give any categorical answer to that question without knowing a good deal more about the circumstances of Luton's housing revenue account. We have said that we intend to pay local authorities a special element of housing subsidy in 1976–77 to enable rent increases to be contained within the 60p national average. The method of calculating an


authority's entitlement to this special element of subsidy is complicated, but I shall try to explain the essence of it.
An authority has to construct a notional housing revenue account according to certain rules which have been prescribed. It is then expected to meet out of its own resources—rents or rates—increased costs in 1976–77 as against this year to the extent of £31 per dwelling per year. If the notional account is still in deficit, the Government intend to pay subsidy for the whole amount of that deficit up to another £21 per dwelling per year.
There is further provision to assist authorities whose notional accounts are in deficit by less than £21 per dwelling and which choose to reduce the rate fund contribution in the notional account, provided they make certain rent increases.
It is not easy to say how Luton's situation fits these guidelines. If it has a deficit in the notional housing revenue account it will qualify for some special element. However, everything depends on the state of the housing revenue account. If my hon. Friend would like to pursue this matter with me I shall be able to give him details when the increases have been agreed by the council.
My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, East raised the matter of Section 105 allocations—the expenditure on improvement of existing houses. In the year 1975–76 the amount allocated was £306,400. The 1976–77 allocation is £430,000. We have just been able to increase the council allocation for 1975·76 by £50,000 because of underspending by another authority.
The allocation for 1976–77 was based upon the Government's priorities as stated by my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Construction in reply to a Question on 4th August 1975. This takes into account contractual commitments; conversions of acquired dwellings to produce housing gain; improvement to

acquired sub-standard dwellings, especially those in action areas and in general improvement areas; the conversion of purpose-built council dwellings to produce housing gain; and the improvement of purpose-built council dwellings lacking full standard amenities.
It is true that a great increase has occurred in the amount of resources allocated to housing, but, because we are concentrating on areas of greatest housing stress, the ordering of priorities is always a difficult matter. We realise that Luton could use more allocation. However, I assure my hon. Friend that all the relevant circumstances have been taken into consideration and that we are constantly reviewing the matter.
My hon. Friend also raised the question of interest rates and the cost of new houses, which is again something to which, unfortunately, there is no easy answer. We are aware of the pressure on local authorities and I shall take heed of what my hon. Friend said.
I hope that I have succeeded in shedding some light on the issues raised by my hon. Friends. There are, of course, many other ways, both financial and advisory, in which the Government can assist, and do assist, a local authority with its housing programme. Housing is, indeed, the greatest social need of our people. If we are to have a good society, our people must be well housed. We are anxious to work with local authorities in order that provision might be made. I can say without hesitation that we recognise the problems and pressures which face Luton because of its circumstances, and that we have done our best to put at the council's disposal a proper share of available funds. I shall be ready at all times to discuss with my hon. Friends the problems which arise from the urgent need in Luton.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at Eleven o'clock.